


Twelve Days of Christmas

by DinobotGlitch, Xobit



Series: Greek'verse [5]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Ancient Greece & Rome, Alternate Universe - Gods & Goddesses, Alternate Universe - Mythology, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-14
Updated: 2014-12-27
Packaged: 2018-03-01 12:54:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 23,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2773706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DinobotGlitch/pseuds/DinobotGlitch, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Xobit/pseuds/Xobit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is set loosely to the theme of 12 Days of Christmas</p><p>And we mean <b>VERY</b> loosely.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Partridge in a Pear Tree

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the first day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> a Partridge in a Pear Tree

Trees sucked, Fireflight decided as he wiggled again in a fruitless attempt to get free of his new friend, and whined when the strange, soft foliage curled tighter about him. No one had told him that there were trees out there that liked to hug things… Granted, that was why he was on the Axiom now – to find out new things. But, hugging plants? Really…? 

Finally, the red and white flier sighed and resigned himself to a simple but depressing fact. He was going to have to call for help. Reluctant even with that knowledge, he turned on his comm. and logged into the primary line to the ship.

–Fireflight to Axiom.– He really didn’t want to make this call, but… Well, the tree was an enthusiastic hugger and he wasn’t getting loose. He’d been trying for almost two joor! 

–Fireflight to Axiom, requesting assistance.– 

There was a moment of static before a bored voice answered, –This is Axiom, Fireflight. What’s your situation?–

–I’m being… um, hugged…– Fireflight felt himself flush hotly. 

–… Hugged.– The tone of the operator was flat and unimpressed. –How is this problematic?–

Fireflight tried to not cringe at the tone but it was hard. He could imagine the ‘stupid youngling’ expression stamped in big glyphs all over the mech’s faceplate, even if he didn’t know what the mech looked like. It was speaking loud and clear in his words, after all! 

–By an indigenous growth!– he elaborated, and was glad no one could see him because his cheek plates were on fire. –It’s a really nice growth and all but I can’t get out of its hugging, and it’s sorta beginning to hurt; it hugs more every time I move.– 

–…– Static filtered through the comm. system again for a moment before shutting off again. A moment later, it crackled back to life and the operator said, –Send me your coordinates and I’ll get someone out to you.– 

–Okay,– Fireflight answered meekly and sent his coordinates as he had been ordered to. 

There was another klik of silence as the coordinates processed, then a second voice came on the line. –Sit tight, fledgling. I’m on the way. Try to keep it from getting a grip on your wings if it hasn’t got ‘em already. It’ll make an extraction easier.–

–Sure…– Fireflight wiggled the aforementioned appendages and huffed deeply. He should probably tell the stranger that it was way too late for that, but he didn’t really want to come off as completely incompetent.

More incompetent than he obviously was.

* * *

Cutting the line with that affirmation, Sandstorm huffed and rolled his shoulders back. Well, better get it over with… 

He supposed, as he stepped off the bridge and made his way to the airlock, that he should be used to this by now. Rookies made mistakes; it was just what they did. But really? The expedition wasn’t even officially begun and this new one, this fledgling Vosian, had already got himself caught up in some nonsense by playing with the indigenous life forms.

And since he was effectively one half helo and could fly straight up while carrying weight without much effort, of course they sent him for extraction nearly every time… Sometimes he wondered if he was kept for his intel or for the new mechs they brought on and trained.

Once outside the ship, he put those thoughts aside and transformed into helo mode. After a quick prep to make sure he was all in order, he took off and headed toward the coordinates projected on his HUD, the distant forest opposite the vast sea that the loading dock faced. At least it wasn’t a water rescue, because those always sucked. Most mechs, even light Vosians, sunk like rocks and were a glitch to get out…

* * *

It had been such a pretty growth – a tree, as one of the older Vosians had called it. Fireflight knew he needed to remember these names but there was just so many! And none of them were at all like any crystal he had ever seen or heard of. This one, in particular, had looked soft and loose with its hanging things… er, branches. He had just wanted to touch one before they left this world! It was just a stopover point; the world was organic in nature and didn’t really have any of the things they needed, nor could it support a colony. Its sun was soft and old, the light weak and without much of an energy yield even on nice orns like this one. 

But the trees! They were so pretty and majestic and soft looking, with branches that ended in long falling tendrils. Fireflight huffed again and fought not to wiggle uncomfortably even as he pouted at the thought of his current captor and its deceptive loveliness. He’d barely touched one of those tendrils before he was wrapped up and caught close to one of the branches; an odd smelling, sticky liquid had started oozing from the tendrils almost immediately after he was secured. And every movement, however small, made the tendrils hug tighter. 

By now it was quite unpleasant and he felt sticky all over… He hoped his rescue would be there soon because he really wanted back on the ship. He was very much done exploring this cycle!

* * *

Sandstorm found himself thanking Tempestas for small favors when it turned out that the flight to the stand of trees that their wayward Vosian was trapped in was a short one. If he had to carry this Fireflight mech all the way back, he would rather have it be as short a distance as possible since more distance meant more effort and, well, the triple changer just didn’t want to deal with all that.

It was easy to see the mech once he had closed in on the given coordinates. Fireflight hadn’t really gone into the stand of trees, merely made himself known at the edge of them. For the best, Sandstorm thought based on what he knew of this particular plant. 

He dipped low and transformed, pedes landing lightly on the ground just as his rotors tucked down his back. While he looked the smaller mech over for any visible injuries, he couldn’t help but call out, asking, “Are you sure you weren’t sparked a bird? Seem to be sitting pretty comfortably up there,” once he was within hearing distance.

Too thankful that help had arrived to be upset at the sudden spook (although he supposed he had heard the whine of engines; they weren’t Seeker engines, which he wasn’t so sure he liked the thought of), Fireflight shook his helm and tried to look over his shoulder at whoever had arrived, to no avail.

“Well, thank you, but no. I’m a Vosian Seeker; I’m not supposed to be perching in the indigenous growth. They just looked so soft! I didn't know they were hugging t-trees? I didn’t know there was any such thing as hugging trees, is that normal? Are there many indigenous growths that act like this?” Even if he couldn’t see them because he was being pressed face down into a branch, Fireflight was so relieved to know someone was there that he didn’t even realize he was being borderline insulted. 

“Could you get me down, please? I really need a bath, I’m all sticky.” 

Of course the young mech was a talker… Why wouldn’t he be? At least he wasn’t panicking. Small favors, indeed. Sandstorm sighed.

“I’ll get you down, just give me a klik.” Sandstorm took a few steps closer so he could inspect the tendrils wrapping themselves around their captive. They didn’t appear strong one by one, but many at once seemed to be an entirely different story. And they grabbed on contact, which left him with only one real option - he would have to see if he couldn’t pull the mech free without touching the branches. As he set about looking for good leverage points to pull the mech from, the orange mech decided to get the Vosian talking about something he could make use of. 

“How did it get you up that high?” he inquired lightly, vorns of practice with fledglings kicking in without a thought. “Were you flying when it caught you?”

“No… they pulled me up here,” Fireflight answered as he tried to crane his head around again to see whoever had been sent after him, only to stop a moment later with a whimpered, “Ouch! And I can’t move at all, they just tighten more! It was fine at first, except the sticky stuff is a bit gross, but now they hurt. They are stronger than they look, and really, really sticky!”

“Hey, don’t move! Gods, they’re all over…” Sandstorm growled to himself. He studied the flier’s predicament for a moment more before shrugging and deciding to pit with it. If they both got stuck, well, there were only so many branches. He’d just light ‘em up if they gave him slag.

“I’m gonna getcha free but you gotta do exactly as I say, okay?”

“Okay? But what are you going to do? There isn’t much room up here and the other tendril things are close so you can’t really–” the Vosian started to say, but stopped, realizing he was speaking all over the place when he was supposed to be listening. 

“Well, there’s plenty of room down here; I’m not too worried about how much room is up there. Let’s see… The fact that the tree pulled you up tells me that the branches are stronger the closer you get to the trunk, so I have to pull you _away_ from that, and the closer I can get you to the ground, the better. Less damage that way.” Sandstorm experimentally prodded a couple of the appendages wrapped around Fireflight’s pede once he was done thinking aloud and made a pleased sound when the leafy vines didn’t reach for him. They couldn’t differentiate between one mech and the next; that was good. It made his life easier, anyway.

“Alright. I’m going to pull by your pedes and try to get to where I can reach above your waist. I should be able to cut you loose from there, but I need you to try and hold absolutely still until then so it doesn’t pull back more than necessary. And for Tempestas’ sake, don’t fire your thrusters on me, got it?” Many a Vosian had panicked at having their sensitive pedes touched and he couldn’t count the number of times he had gotten scorched plating as thanks for his help!

“Ouch! Okay, I’ll be still, just get me out of here before this indigenous tree growth hugs me to scrap metal, please!” for the first time a bit of panic entered Fireflight’s tone, the prodding having enticed the tendrils to tighten yet again. “I promise not to use my thrusters; they don’t help anyways, just please hurry!”

Sandstorm, knowing that was the best he would get (and honestly better than he expected, sans the panic creeping into the fledgling’s voice, of course), grabbed white pedes and pulled without any further warning. There was some resistance, as he knew there would be, but the chances of an organic getting the better of him was slim to none. His only regret was that he couldn’t reach to cut the plants from the fledgling’s wings; he had no doubt that the strain of this would be worst on them, and he felt awful about that. 

Nevertheless once he had a good grip on the Vosian’s waist, just below the dip of his angled wings, Sandstorm hacked at the vines indiscriminately and before either of them knew it, the triple changer had Fireflight free of the pest. The gods always saw fit to rain on his parade, though, and the weight of the flier suddenly collapsing on top him forced him to the ground with a wheeze of a grunt emitting upon impact and a curse shortly after.

“Oh!” Fireflight had been whimpering and making pained noises as the tendrils tried to hold on to him, and the relief from the pain was a surprise. He sat up and looked around, then down. He was straddling his rescuer and couldn’t help but smile, optics wide and bright with delight as he realized the other was a multi changer of some sort. 

He had orange optics though? Mostly orange anyway…

“Watcha lookin’ at?” Sandstorm asked when he realized the flier was staring, the knowledge enough to distract him from grumbling about fragging heavy Vosians landing on him. Feeling oddly uncomfortable with those big (Tempestas help him, they were _huge_ ) gold optics focused on him, he shifted a little and looked away. “You could at least say thanks ‘stead of gaping like a fish.”

“You are awesome! I love you!” Fireflight enthusiastically hugged the stranger, laughing with ecstatic relief. 

“Thank you so much for getting me out of that tree thing! I thought it would hug me to death or something! Who are you? Where are you from? Are you Tyger Paxian, because your optics are Tarnite orange, so I’m confused, but I really, really think you are totally awesome!” 

Completely without his consent, Sandstorm’s faceplates heated and he could only be grateful for his battle mask hiding the worst of it. What the pit kind of reaction was this? He knew Seekers could be, well, openly affectionate, but Fireflight didn’t even know him! Slag, he didn’t even know Fireflight aside from his name, and that was only because he had just had it told to him less than a joor ago. 

“Uh…” he said eloquently into the Vosian’s shoulder. Of all the possible reactions… He was so not equipped to handle this! “I’m Sandstorm, survey specialist… From Tarn, not Tyger Pax.”

“That is so cool! I’m Fireflight, but you probably already knew that. I’m a scout. I mean that’s my function– oh! I should get off of you, shouldn’t I? We’re about to leave here I guess, thank Primus!” Fireflight got up and stretched, making an ‘eww’ noise and drooping his wings when he realized just how icky sticky he was. 

“I need to use the wash racks, and so do you!” he exclaimed succinctly, looking them both over with a vague expression of disgust. “We look like we’re covered in lubricant! Come on, let’s go back.” Grabbing a large black hand and digging his thrustered heels into the dirt, the primarily white mech pulled at his rescuer. 

Not sure what else to do, Sandstorm allowed himself to be hoisted to his pedes. He was feeling no small amount overwhelmed by this strange Vosian who, among other things, apparently had no processor-vocalizer filter. Yes, they did look like they were covered in lubricant, but did Fireflight really need to point it out?

The triple changer put up no fight as he was led back the way he had flown (on pede because he didn’t want to risk them transforming and getting this gunk in their internals), though he did at least have the awareness to take his hand back from the red and white flier. He didn’t need to be led along like some turbopuppy, even if he kind of felt like one when Fireflight turned to grin at him again, all cheer now that he was free to move as he pleased once more. It was an infectious expression, for he couldn’t help grinning, himself…

As they trudged onward, Sandstorm was a little annoyed to realize that he _wasn’t_ annoyed at the other mech for getting caught anymore. It was hard to be mad at someone who was so, well, cute! Cute and innocent and actually kind of funny because by the gods, he could talk. And talk he did, about anything and everything. And he often found little things, like other plants or some weird wildlife to look at, which made the trip back to their ship even more drawn out…

Strange to think he didn’t mind, but he didn’t. He blamed it entirely on Fireflight landing on him. It probably broke his CPU somehow.

Yes, that was exactly what happened…


	2. Two Turtle Doves

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the second day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

“Sandstorm, Sandstorm!” Fireflight’s bubbly voice echoed in the loading bay, demanding the attention of the mech who had just come back with his team with an exuberance that many on the ship had come to expect from the fledgling. He had no mind for any of that though; he wanted to talk to Sandstorm! 

In his haste to get to the orange mech, Fireflight nearly collided with another Seeker, whose arms were full of datapads; he only barely dodged under the mech’s wing and gave a halfsparked apology before slamming into his target with all his might. The move almost bowled the massive triple changer over (probably would have if he had had more mass to throw against him) but as it was, he ended up clinging to the Tarnite’s torso with all his limbs, giggling and blabbering questions. 

“Did you get to see the green liquid thing? I wasn’t allowed to cross it, it wasn’t in my scouting sector, was it awesome? Cold? Hot? Did it have anything living in it? Are you going out again next shift or can we play a game? I’m _bored_ , Sandstorm, why can’t the scouts help with the mapping?” 

Sandstorm laughed and wrapped an arm around Fireflight’s shoulders while he leaned forward to steady himself. Much as he had come to expect this kind of behavior, it was nigh impossible to stay balanced with this rambunctious Vosian around!

The questions, however, were easy enough to handle because Fireflight rarely seemed to care if he skipped a few, and when he did, he just asked again instead of getting upset.

“How many times have I had to pull your aft out of the fire now? And you still want to go near foreign stuff… Well, you definitely picked the right job for that,” he chuckled, hooking his free arm under the fledgling for more support as he moved out of the middle of the walkway. “C’mon, let me get some energon and we can hang out for a bit and I’ll tell you about it.”

“I’m a scout! Getting into trouble is part of the job description,” Fireflight insisted. He then nuzzled his face plates under Sandstorm’s chin and clung on as they moved. If he was lucky, he wouldn’t be put down. That was just fine with him! 

Nacelle watched the spectacle with a frown, having barely managed to twist to one side before the younger Seeker threw himself at the triple changer. Someone should really say something to the Tarnite about his behavior, preferably before things ended in either sadness or violence. The fledgling didn’t know better, and well… It was a _Tarnite_. 

Hm…

* * *

“Hey, hey! Survey mech!” To Nacelle’s annoyance, it had been almost impossible to find the triple changer without a red and white seeker burr plastered to some part of him. This, of course, only helped cement his belief that he needed to inform the Tarnite of a few things! 

He sped up as much as was socially polite in an effort to catch the orange mech and called again. “Wait up; I would like a word with you!” 

Sandstorm turned at the call instinctively even though he wanted nothing more than to crawl into his berth for a nap before he had to go out again. Most of the preliminary surveying was done for this planet, but his work never seemed done nowadays. If he wasn’t answering to Command, he was imputing information or chatting with Fireflight about things they had seen. It was fun, but exhausting, and he wanted to take advantage of the fact that Fireflight was out doing his own job to catch a cycle or two of recharge. 

Nowhere in there did his wishes coincide with talking to some random Vosian, but the gods toyed with his wishes all the time so he resigned himself to it, stopping to one side of the hall right before the residential sector and waiting for the other to catch up.

“What’s up? I’m supposed to be off right now.”

“This isn’t official stuff,” Nacelle assured the larger mech before shrugging uncomfortably. “I’m… I suppose I am here to warn you.” Nacelle frowned. “You shouldn’t spend so much time with the fledgling. It won’t end well at all, and he is very young – younger than you’d think, even if he is technically adult.” 

And ‘technically’ was the issue here. Fireflight was in his final upgrade; he was slowly losing the last marks of the young, but he was still a fledgling by Vosian terms. His spark was not mature enough to have begun searching out trine mates or a resonance partner. His factual age aside, he was a child still, a youngling. 

The triple changer frowned, turning the rest of the way around to face the other flier. He didn’t like the mech’s tone or his words one bit but it didn’t do to jump to conclusions… “What are you trying to say? I know he’s young. But we’re just friends, anyway, so what’s this about?”

“Are you sure that’s what he thinks?” Nacelle lifted an optical ridge, dermas pulling into a somewhat supercilious smile. 

“He’s young, you are handsome… Really, there are things that older mechs just shouldn’t do. I’m telling you, don’t encourage him.” 

At that, Sandstorm scowled. Just who did this mech think he was?

“Are you trying to imply that there’s more going on than friendship on my part?” he asked, tone level but promising bad things if he got an answer he didn’t like.

“I’m saying that he might think there is more to this. We, Vosians, are not like others… Just make sure he’s clear on what’s going on, before you break his spark.” With that, Nacelle figured he had given enough of a warning and thought he better make himself scarce. Fast… the Tarnite triple changer was quite a bit bigger than him and clearly had a bad temper. 

Perhaps he should warn off Fireflight as well?

For all that Sandstorm seriously thought he should just kick the Vosian’s skidplate for even _suggesting_ that he was out to hurt Fireflight, the orange mech knew his time would be better spent getting some recharge. That in mind, he turned away from the retreating Seeker and headed for his cabin. The long walk only served to remind him just how beat he was and by the time he collapsed onto the pliable mesh of his berth, he was so gone that all he could think about was how uncomfortable he used to think these things were. Maybe they just got softer over time and he had to break his in… 

Kind of like how he wanted to break that Seeker’s face in, since he was thinking about it. Slagger would deserve it, too, telling him who he could and couldn’t befriend and hang out with. Even if it did seem that he and Fireflight were attached at the hip these cycles. Whose business was that but theirs?

And he had no time to think about it anyway! Fireflight would be back soon and he would want to talk about all the things he had seen (and possibly gotten a little too close to before his team leader could stop him) and he’d be damned if some stupid, clueless wing-ding was going to be the reason he missed out on it!


	3. Three French Hens

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the third day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

Sandstorm knew a trap when he saw one, especially when it came to Fireflight. Obviously, these traps were rarely (but not never) intentional, but they were traps nonetheless. Telltale signs of such subterfuge were words like ‘pretty’ or ‘shiny’, but phrases were the real attention grabbers. Mainly, any conversation that started with, “You should really see this thing I found!” was a good indicator that they were about to end up in some type of trouble.

And he still went along with it. What did that say about him?

Currently, he and the Vosian were flying over some rather menacing looking outcroppings of rock on Omega-217 toward one of these ‘things’ the mech had found. Omega-217 was a recently discovered dwarf planet in an adjacent solar system, and he could honestly say he had never been out this far on the surface of it before. Which begged the question of what Fireflight would be doing out here, but there were more pressing concerns – one of which he addressed presently.

“‘Flight, how much further is it? We’re not supposed to be outside the ship past starset. You do remember how hot the surface gets, right?”

“It’s not that much further, I promise it’s worth it!” Fireflight rolled in his alt mode, the tetra jet flying just as easily belly up as it did right way up in the planet’s thin atmosphere. He was excited to share his discovery with Sandstorm, because the Tarnite always appreciated things. Not quite like he did, but then, where would the fun be if they reacted the same?

“We just need to get to the end of this terrain and out over the plains; I hope they haven’t moved…” 

‘They’? Oh, yes… This was shaping up to be a recipe for disaster, alright. Fireflight’s affinity for finding and loving the natives of a planet was devastatingly strong, and no amount of mishaps seemed to cure it.

Oh well.

“And just what are we looking for?” Sandstorm asked indulgently even as the rocks below them began to thin out, denoting that the plains his friend had mentioned were not far off.

“Um, they are kinda bulbous and have like layered armor, so cute though! And they make this strange sound… like pludderpludderpludder,” Fireflight tried to mimic the sound, lazily spinning his alt mode and then whooping loudly with joy. 

“There they are, see? Ain’t they just the most adorable puffy things?” He transformed and hovered, pointing down at the big, kind of bloated looking, creatures that were scraping at the metallic ground with misshapen, three pronged pedes that sported some pretty impressive claws. 

Not having the same hovering capabilities as his Vosian counterpart outside of helo form, Sandstorm stayed some ways back as he transformed and dropped to the ground. He stared down one beady eyed beast with some distaste and said, “I dunno about all that, Fireflight.” Pointing to the one eyeballing him, he said, “This one looks like someone put tainted antifreeze in his energon.”

“Oh, Sandstorm! It _is_ adorable! Do you think we could get authorization to bring one back? I mean… the scientists want to study the life here, right? And… it’s relatively small, maybe I could adopt it after?” Fireflight giggled, and then turned big and hopeful optics on his friend. 

Clearly, Fireflight’s definition of ‘adorable’ needed work. That thing was not slagging cute; it was ugly as sin and had a mean glint in its optic to boot!

“I don’t think they’re gonna give us authorization to even go near them, personally. We’re not equipped to handle the life forms, only observe them if we happen across ‘em.” Still, it was hard to resist those optics and Sandstorm just hated when they got all dark and sad… “But maybe they’ll let you play with one, at least? Did you tell anyone else they were here?”

“Noo…” Fireflight drooped, dropping his optics away from Sandstorm, “I wanted to show them to you first because they are so cute!” He thought they were cute anyway! And so very different and just… 

One of the things sort of fluffed up and made that funny pludderpludder noise and he couldn’t help but giggle.

“Did you hear that? Did you? Isn’t that just the funniest noise ever?” 

Well, that, they could agree on. “It is a funny sound,” he said, smiling a little. He took his optics off the fat little bird-like creature to look imploringly up at Fireflight. “But much as I’m honored that you showed me first, ‘cause you know I like seeing these things as much as you, we probably should have reported these to the science department… What if they’re not here next dark cycle? I guess they’d be our own secret then, huh?”

“I’m sure there are more than these three… but, if that’s a problem, shouldn’t we catch one for them?” Hope springs eternal, and Fireflight’s optics gleamed with it. 

“Well…” Sandstorm looked at Fireflight, then the bird (which was staring right back at him with an expression he couldn’t quite decipher), then Fireflight again. He did have a point… Slaggit all, he actually had a point. 

“I suppose we might want to try, at least… No clue what kind of defenses these things have, but they don’t appear aggressive, so maybe if we’re non-threatening, we can nab one…”

“Yay!” Fireflight spun, and then realized that might not have been the best reaction when the three bloated creatures began making their weird noise very loudly. He clapped his hands over his mouth and shrugged apologetically at Sandstorm. 

“Non-threatening means no loud noises,” Sandstorm teased good-naturedly. The noise from the beasts was irritating at its present level though, and he grimaced while watching one of the birds suspiciously as it edged closer to him, its little head twitching every which way. “You still sure you want one of these things?” 

“Yes, oh, just look at the way it moves, it’s so cute!” Fireflight answered, whispering loudly so as not to startle the beings again. They were not saying pludderpludder anymore, but rather a mix very much like gokgok, cluck and bock in different combinations. He clapped his hands when the things started moving towards Sandstorm. 

“Oh look! Sand’, they like you!” 

Sandstorm didn’t think that was such a good thing. As they stalked closer, he couldn’t help but feel that they didn’t like him quite in the way that Fireflight meant. Only stubbornness made the triple changer stand his ground instead of taking a step back, but really, how bad could they be? He wasn’t flimsily armored like they were, so unless they had some kind of corrosive weaponry, he would be fine.

That didn’t mean he wanted them to scratch him up, however.

“You know, we didn’t really think about how we’re going to carry this all the way back and I dunno about you, but I don’t want one of these things in me, mucking with delicate stuff… Maybe we should just leave it,” he said to Fireflight, tone a little uneasy as the largest one came up and tapped its beak against his calf as if searching for something. He shooed it away with a slight shake of his leg, but it was back again almost immediately.

“Aww, they really, really like you!” Fireflight giggled, landing lightly on the ground and peering around Sandstorm’s bulk at the pecking creature. 

“I have a carry net somewhere in my subspace, let me just…” he turned a little and began digging though his main subspace compartment, “no… hmm, no, oh that’s where it went! Sandstorm, I found the goodie box. And, what’s this?” he half spoke and half mumbled as he shifted things around, occasionally pulling this or that out to frown or giggle at it.

While Fireflight sorted through his messy subspace pocket, Sandstorm attempted to fend off increasingly ardent attempts to peck at his legs. “Uh, ‘Flight… I don’t think they like me at all because they’re being pretty fraggin’ rude right now!” 

“Oh, silly! They just want to play,” Fireflight replied, though he was a little too distracted to actually look at what the creatures were doing. “I’m sure they don’t even know what being polite is. They are not precisely intelligent, you know?” 

“Play…!” the triplechanger repeated incredulously. “You call this ‘play’?” Sandstorm flicked one of the pests with his pede, irritation evident, and growled when it bit him in retaliation. A klik later, irritation was replaced with shock when pain registered and he realized the thing was actually trying to chew its way through his plating. “What the slag…?!”

“Sandstorm?” the changed tone pulled Fireflight from his search to look around his friend and down on the bulbous creatures. 

“Is it… is it chewing on you?” Unease stirred deep in his tank, but mainly he was just confused. “But it doesn’t have any dentals, just that beak thing!” 

“That ‘beak thing’ is strong enough!” Sandstorm assured Fireflight as he kicked the thing again, significantly harder this time, to dislodge it from his now mangled shin panel. Without waiting for another one to get brave enough to take its kin’s place, he transformed and got himself back up in the air. Once a safe distance from the ground, he ran a diagnostic on himself and groaned a little. “The fragger was actually _eating_ my plating, ‘Flight. It took a pretty good chunk out when I kicked it and, look! It’s chewing it!”

Fireflight backed away from the two other things, nervous and rather shocked. They were just some small, weird looking creatures. They were not supposed to be dangerous!

“They looked so cute!” he nearly wailed, backing into a rock before he realized he might benefit from using his thrusters. “I didn’t want to get you hurt!” 

The alien creatures flapped around and made angry versions of their funny noises. They were a lot less cute now… 

Despite the outrageousness of the situation (not to mention the fact that he was injured, and _that_ was going to be fun to explain to the medics), Sandstorm found a glimmer of humor in their predicament. Fireflight really was a trap, after all, and he always fell for it… Hook, line and sinker.

Still, he did his best not to rub it in that he had been right about how this wasn’t a good idea as he came to hover beside the red and white mech. “Don’t worry yourself over it. It’s just a little superficial damage; there weren’t even any broken lines,” he said, tone soft and placating. “It was worth it, anyway. We got to see them first, right?”

“I guess…” Fireflight was drooping as much as he could when hovering, looking down at the agitated creatures with a pouty frown. 

“I guess I should stop showing you things, we always get into trouble…”

Sandstorm would have shaken his head if he was in biped form. Fireflight didn’t really think he was upset about this, did he? “Aww, c’mon, ‘Flight. Don’t say stuff like that! I’d get into all the trouble in the universe as long as I was doing it with you. That’s what friends are for.”

“Really?” Fireflight looked up, optics wide and hopeful. Not that he didn’t think that Sandstorm was telling the truth… but… He had gotten him chewed on by an alien. 

“Really!” the triplechanger laughed. “Trust me; I don’t mind getting trouble with you at all. Now let’s head back, okay? Sky’s starting to brighten, so we need to. I can handle a couple of bites, but not scorched plating.”

“Right!” Fireflight was in a lot better mood, and merrily transformed to fly with Sandstorm. At first he kept pace but as the flight dragged on he began looping and playing in the air, with the air. Not long after that, he started to chatter at his friend again, tone happy, spilling everything from old to new, thought and act. 

There wasn’t one mean patch in Fireflight, nor was there much consideration of cause and effect. He was so young still.


	4. Four Calling Birds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the fourth day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> four Calling Birds  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

“Really?” Fireflight asked rhetorically while he glared at his personal terminal. The accursed machine was beeping the merry tune of an incoming spatial call. _Again._ When he was supposed to be meeting up with Sandstorm on the observation deck for a cube and a chat. But… What if it was his brothers? Or Creators?

He wavered and then huffed, wings drooping. 

[Sorry, Sandstorm, I can’t make it but I’ll try and catch up with you later. Got another call… So sorry! I’ll make it up to you, promise!] the Vosian sent, the text barely a thought but so habitual that that was all that was needed. It was more and more often now that they kept in contact that way than through actual face-to-face communication… Fireflight hated it!

[It’s cool, ‘Flight. Just shoot me a message when you’re done and we’ll try to reschedule, alright?] The return text pinged off even as he rather reluctantly sat down and pressed ‘accept’ on his terminal. The text even had one of those symbol smiley faces tacked on that Sandstorm knew he liked. It was a small consolation, but it nevertheless brought a flicker of a grin to his faceplates. He really did want to talk to his family… It was just that he had been looking forward to star gazing with his friend, too!

“Yeah?” he spoke before the picture had even formed out of the usual multicolored static. Fireflight really tried not to look or sound annoyed, but he wasn’t sure how well he did… 

“Hi, Fireflight!” Skydive greeted cheerfully after the screen flickered to life. “How’s our favorite scraplet doing? We miss you!”

“Yeah, and that’s no way to greet your brothers, anyway!” Slingshot cut in before Skydive could go off on a tangent. “We make an effort to call you and you’re all snippy. You got a hot date or somethin’?” The words would have sounded rhetorical from anyone else, but from Slingshot, they were a thinly veiled threat of bodily harm on anyone who might be trying to get in with his kid brother.

“You are always asking me that! Slings, I’m too young for any of that,” Fireflight answered, wings going up and stiff on his back, a pout forming on his derma. 

“I was just on my way to refuel and star gaze a bit with a friend, is all. But of course I am happy that you call me, I love you! It’s just that I keep getting interrupted in things as of late.” And if he had been anyone but who he was he might have been suspicious. However… he was precisely not the kind of person to be suspicious. 

Slingshot’s expression darkened predictably. “The same one as last time? That whatever-his-name-was… The Tarnite. He’s a helo, isn’t he?” He glanced at Skydive for confirmation.

“Yes… You seem to spend an awful lot of time with that mech, Fireflight. Aren’t there any more… appropriate choices available on your new team?” 

Skydive hated that he even had to question the motives of a mech he had never met, but with all of the calls they had gotten warning them of this mech that let Fireflight hang all over him, he couldn’t help it. The mech seemed perfectly content to be with him all the time, even, so there was no limit to the amount of contact they had, and that told them that something needed to be done. If it was just an occasional thing he was sure it would be fine; Fireflight was a physical type of mech. But every orn, every place they visited… 

And then their Creator called him to tell him that the two of them had snuck out on their own one night and the Tarnite had come back injured but both of them were in disgustingly high spirits! Skydive honestly didn’t know what was worse: the potential for harm, or Fireflight’s obliviousness to it.

“What do you mean ‘appropriate’? Sandstorm is nice and he likes it when I blabber.” Fireflight frowned more, his tone almost sarcastic on the last word. As a Seeker who had been told to shut up too many times, he couldn’t help it… Sandstorm was such a nice change to that! He was always willing to listen and talk back, not afraid to break in to steer him back on topic or simply tell him that there was a need for quiet time. Not ‘shut up’, not ‘stop blabbering’. No, never in a negative manner!

“And he never ever tells me I’m incompetent or wrong just because I make a mistake!” This time, he glared at both of his brothers almost viciously. 

Skyfire at least had the decency to look ashamed at the pointed jab, but he pressed on nevertheless. 

“ _Age_ appropriate… From what I understand, he’s significantly older than you… What if his motives toward you are impure? You know we worry about you, Fireflight, and this mech showing so much interest in you when he’s been a part of that crew for as long as you say and surely has other friends – well, we don’t like it.”

“Well too fragging bad then! For once I have a friend that likes me for me, so deal with it!” Fireflight wished he could keep being angry, but instead his dermas started trembling and his wings drooped along with the rest of him. 

“I have a friend! Why is that so bad? He’s not in the least interested in anything but having a friend either!” he wailed. 

“‘Flight…” Skydive started, but Slingshot interrupted him. 

“It’s bad for a lot of reasons, Fireflight!” the smaller Vosian said forcefully. “And you don’t know that he only wants to be friends! I’ve seen mechs do more than he does for a bit of tail. How much could you two realistically have in common, anyway? He’s not even one of us, for Zephyrus’ sake!”

“You are so mean!” Fireflight half rose, leaning forward to glare at Slingshot. “You are the one who doesn’t know what you are talking about! You are doing what everyone else is always doing to us! You don’t even know him and you’re judging him! He’s never so much as touched me inappropriately!” 

“That doesn’t mean he isn’t thinking it!” Slingshot snapped back, pushing Skydive aside so he could be front and center on screen. “You think we haven’t been getting calls about you? He lets you cling all over him like some kind of space barnacle, even encourages it by holding you there! What kind of friend is so physically intimate?”

“A good friend who knows that I like feeling safe! Something you never understood, but seemed to enjoy exploiting a lot when I was a hatchling!” Fireflight snarled back, one sharp tipped finger poking at the screen in lieu of being able to poke his brother in the chest. 

“Or don’t you think I remember how mean you were then too?” He bared his fanged dentals, anger taking over from the fact that he was being both impolite and disrespectful. But really? Were they not being so in return? Implying that he couldn’t even manage to form a regular friendship all on his own?

Slingshot threw his hands up in frustration. “That’s different! I’m your brother, that’s what I’m supposed to do!” he growled in exasperation. “Gods! Just, forget it! I’ll tell Air Raid to call you; maybe he can talk some sense into you!”

With those parting words, Slingshot stormed off, and the sound of a door cycling open and closed came shortly after, as well as the roar of the mech’s engine as he transformed and took off. 

Once he was gone, Skydive sighed and moved back in front of the terminal. “Fireflight… You know he means well. We really love you and just, this… It doesn’t seem safe. Please understand.”

“All I understand is that you are all butting into my life even though I’m not even near you! I just want to be left alone to choose my own friends and my own life!” Fireflight growled uncharitably. “I don’t know why half the ship thinks it’s their mission to report on me! I’m not a hatchling anymore; I’m not even a youngling! I…” he broke off and actually hiccuped from distress. 

“I just want to be friends with Sandstorm and have everyone butt out of it!” 

“You’re also not at full maturity, and much as you may hate that fact, it _is_ a fact. So can you blame us if we worry?” Skydive asked, but then shook his head. He had been that age once… “I know you can blame us, and you clearly do. But I wish you would think of our side as well. We’re your brothers and we want what’s best for you and, frankly, I don’t think that this mech is what’s best for you.”

Fireflight snarled at the most level minded of his brothers, feeling utterly betrayed. He couldn’t believe that Skydive, of all of them, was basing his opinions on nothing but a few Seekers’ too active imaginations. “You don’t even know him!” 

This was not the Skydive he knew… Not at all! 

“‘Flight, even Silverbolt is saying this is bad news!” Skydive insisted, only slightly shocked that Fireflight would snarl at him. He could see that this Sandstorm mech meant a lot to him, but… there was still an uneasiness he couldn’t ignore. None of them could.

“I don’t know him, but I do know people. And people don’t just… They don’t make friends with sweet young mechs like you without an ulterior motive very often. Rarely, in fact, if ever at all.”

“You are just like everyone else! I didn’t think I’d ever… I can’t believe you,” Fireflight sank back down onto his chair, wings dropping as he turned half away from the screen. He felt so deeply disappointed and hurt! So he had not had his first heat. That did not make him a moron. He knew how to say no, but more importantly? He trusted Sandstorm to back off if he said no! “I always thought you were better than that, Skydive. Slingshot, Air Raid, even our Creator… but not you! Not you, Sky’, you never judge like that.” 

Skydive clenched his fists in frustration and, yes, a bit of shame. Perhaps it was out of his character, but desperate times called for desperate measures! “I’m worried about you, and about this relationship you’re developing! Why is that so bad? Do you not realize how far away you are right now? How am I supposed to be there for you if something goes wrong when you’re so far away?”

“It’s not bad that you worry, Sky’, it is bad that you immediately think that I am incapable of choosing honorable friends.” Big, sad optics turned to the screen, as he continued, “It’s bad that you don’t trust me even as little as that… That’s not protecting me, Sky’, that’s trying to make me afraid of the world!” 

“But you know what? If that is how it is going to be I’ll just not talk to any of you! You don’t know Sandstorm, you don’t know anything but what some mean sparked nasty know-it-alls been filling your audio receptors with. And it is really sad that you chose to trust them over me,” Fireflight growled and reached out to cancel the call. 

Knowing his brother well enough to know that he was really serious this time, Skydive raised his hands up in surrender and said, “Wait, Fireflight, don’t hang up! Please… You’re right… We don’t know him. But we do know how trusting you can be, and how easy it would be to take advantage of you. As you so aptly pointed out before, we’ve done it…”

“And you think I didn’t learn anything from you?” Fireflight stopped, glaring at his brother, dermas pressed into a tight angry line. “I’m not as trusting as you think, not anymore! You all taught me to be careful.” Dermas twisted in something that might have been a wry smile if not for the fact that the normally so cheerful Seeker was royally pissed off. 

“I trust Sandstorm! And right now? Right now I trust him a Pit of a lot more than I trust any of you! Zephyrus be my witness on that!”

“You trust some mech you’ve only known a couple of groons more than your own family?” Skydive asked incredulously. He didn’t think he should be as shocked as he was, and who could blame him? As family, they had always been there for him… Surely Fireflight didn’t mean it. How could he trust this Tarnite more than his own brothers?

“Yes! Which isn’t very fun to say, but yes, frag it, Sky’, I mean it. Think it over. He’s trusted me since we met, but you guys? You didn’t even call to ask if I had gotten friends or if I enjoyed my first tour of duty! No, you called and jumped on my wings for having a friend who ‘undoubtedly’ was only out to get my seals! And why? Because some nosy Seekers on here told you he was ‘grabby’ with me. You didn’t ask _me_ if it was true or not, you just stamped him as bad news and me as an incompetent moron!” Fireflgiht spat, and then sat back, visibly fighting to get his rarely raised temper down to a manageable level. He hated being angry, more so when it was at his family, all of whom, faults and all, he loved dearly. But in this, he was angry at them all! Furious with them, really, to the point that he was truly tempted to cut off communication with them for a good long while. Maybe even till this tour was over and he went back to Vos.

“So yes, I don’t really want to talk to any of you. You are all a bunch of judgmental, entitled fraggers!” 

“Well it’s not like you tried to prove otherwise! You just huff and pout like a hatchling and then expect us to believe you when you don’t defend yourself. I mean, you’re not even denying your… physical closeness. But he _is_ grabby with you. Holding you all the time, I hear, and he’s even pet your wings!” You just didn’t play with a Vosian’s wings unless you wanted something! Surely even Fireflight knew that!

“I should not have to defend myself!” and the snarl was back, “Air Raid never had to do so, Slingshot never had to, _you_ never had to! I don’t see why I have to!” It just was not fair!

“He’s never done anything I haven’t allowed. Just as I never do anything he does not allow, and if you guys can’t believe that you then I really do not want to talk to you right now. The one time, _one time_ , he pet my wing I told him not to do so, and why, and since then he hasn’t touched them!” not that Skydive would believe him, none of them believed him when it came to this.

Skydive growled and made a cutting motion with his hand. “None of us ever consorted with an outsider! Other Vosians, that’s one thing… But this mech isn’t one of us and he doesn’t know our ways – whether or not you explain or if he listens, he doesn’t understand us. Do you not see the situation you’ve put yourself in, Fireflight? Distant kin, they may be, but Tarnites operate entirely differently. I don’t want to see you hurt, and I fear that’s exactly what this will come to if you continue this relationship with him.”

“It is a _friendship_ , and it is _mine_! Not yours, not Air Raid’s, not Slingshot’s and not our Creator’s!” Fireflight jumped up again, wings flaring with rage. 

“There is no reason for you all to get involved just because Sandstorm happens to be a Tarnite, and I am telling you right now! One more of these calls and I will tell the comm. officer, who by the grace of Zephyrus is not a Seeker, to cancel all incoming calls. So you guys can choose how you want it to be, hm, since you like deciding things for me so much! Now goodbye!” Smiling rather viciously, the white Vosian slammed a hand onto the ‘end call’ button, and every button around it, making the screen blank and the terminal emit a series of protesting beeps. 

Really, the nerve of them! He had missed out on time with Sandstorm for _that_ load of slag?


	5. Five Golden Rings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the fifth day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> five Golden Rings  
> four Calling Birds  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

Having given up on making preconceived plans with Fireflight because they always seemed to be interrupted and really, this was best as a surprise anyway, Sandstorm kept quiet about the newest thing he wanted to show his friend until literally the very last moment. Well, it wasn’t _new_ exactly, but Fireflight had never seen it before, so it kind of was?

It had been a while since his last trip to this sector, but he remembered all too well the strange glow of the string of planets they were coming upon, and he couldn’t wait to see the look on his friend’s face when he saw one in particular.

Now, if only the mech would wake up so he could show it to him!

Ringing the chime to Fireflight’s room again, Sandstorm shifted from pede to pede. 

“‘Flight!” he called as loud as he dared, not wanting to wake any of the others that resided in this hall. “C’mon, get up. It’s important!”

“Mugh,” Fireflight pushed away the pillow he had tried to block his audio receptor with and glared blearily at the terminal. Sure, no one had mentioned Sandstorm since he had yelled at Skydive, but the calls had not stopped. This however… um, actually, this wasn’t his terminal? Flickering his optics, he nearly jumped when the noise sounded again, along with a muffled voice. 

Oh, the door! 

He almost fell off the berth and stumbled over to key the door open, then stared blearily at the bright orange chest plate residing at optic high. 

“Uh?” 

“Finally! I was starting to wonder if you were in at all!” Sandstorm said by way of greeting. He wisely chose not to comment on Fireflight’s, dare he say, cuteness as the mech attempted to cycle himself out of recharge seemingly on willpower alone, but instead went straight for the core of why he was there. ”I’ve got something really amazing to show you; I promise it’ll be worth the loss of your warm berth for a few breems.”

“Uhu,” Fireflight put a hand on Sandstorm’s chest and pushed him away from the door before following him outside and keying it shut and locked. 

“Guh?” he questioned, still more offline than online, looking up at the Tarnite triple changer with dim golden optics. 

“You’re gonna have to be a little more specific with your questions if you want actual answers,” Sandstorm teased, even as he gently took one of the Vosian’s hands in his own and began to lead him down the hall and out of the residential sector of the ship. “Now come on, we don’t want to be late and miss it!”

“Bah,” Fireflight rubbed his olfactory sensor with his free hand, the occupied one tightening on Sandstorm’s. He’d need a couple of breem to form anything remotely coherent and the triple changer could just deal with that! He was the one who’d shown up at this ungodly joor, fraggit all! What in Zephyrus’ name could there be to see this late… or early, depending on how you looked at it. 

Sandstorm just laughed at his friend’s inhospitable expression as they entered the lift that would take them to the observation deck just below the bridge. Fireflight could be so slagging adorable that it wasn’t even right… 

Once they disembarked the lift, he pulled Fireflight toward the wide, floor-to-ceiling windows that took up most of the outward facing wall. Taking in the still somewhat dazed expression on the red and white mech’s faceplates, he said, “I never took you for being such a heavy recharger. You’re always so spunky during the light cycle that I thought you would be like that all the time.”

“Eh,” Fireflight just looked at the Tarnite for a moment, and then shook his head. He wasn’t spunky in the least when getting dragged out of berth with only half a recharge cycle; who would be? That would just be obnoxious. 

“Gotta ‘ave least three quarters of a cycle,” he mumbled tiredly, “What ya wanna show me?” 

“I will bear that in mind in the future,” said Sandstorm as he made his way to the furthest edge of the window. Instead of directly answering Fireflight’s following question, he said, “It’s just something I saw a long time ago that I remembered when I was told we were passing through here. We should be able to see it any moment now; there’s no way you’ll miss it.”

“Okay,” Fireflight leaned on the cool window, wondering what it was actually made of more than what Sandstorm was going to show him. When he was tired his thoughts always wandered off on him like that. He knew it was called forceglass, but what _that_ was, he didn’t know. 

His meandering thoughts came to a screeching halt when the ship finally rounded the planet they were passing and gave a view of the entire inner planetary system. It was breathtaking, but that was not why his thoughts stopped and his cooling fans stalled out. 

The planet almost straight in front of them was a gas giant, five distinct rings around it… and entirely gold. All nuances of gold imaginable, all the colors of all seeker optics ever. He had never seen something so… so… 

Beautiful seemed a pale word. 

Sandstorm didn’t have to ask to know that Fireflight liked what he saw. He hadn’t been kidding when he said it couldn’t be missed! 

The fact that the behemoth outside the window was a veritable clone of Vosian optics has not been lost on him even the first time he saw it, but seeing it now, reflected in his friend’s optics as it was, made it all the more spectacular. The triple changer refused to acknowledge that he was staring at Fireflight’s optics more than the planet though. 

Fireflight had no idea how long they stood there, staring as the ship made its way through the planetary system towards the heliopause with a deceptive sense of slowness. The planet was so fantastically beautiful that time was irrelevant…

But eventually they moved away and the planet disappeared into the wonder of other phenomena and vistas, none of which could hold Fireflight’s attention. 

“Thank you,” it wasn’t much above a whisper, but he didn’t feel like this needed to be shouted out. It was something he would hold close to his spark though, that Sandstorm had wanted to share this beauty with him.

Despite himself, Sandstorm grinned. “You’re welcome. I told you it’d be worth it… I remembered how beautiful it was when I saw it the first time, and I thought of you.” The words were out before he could catch them, and heat suffused the Tarnite’s cheeks as he realized how that could be taken and tried to clarify. “That is, that you like, uh, pretty things… I thought you would enjoy it. Not… But I mean…” Why did this suddenly feel so awkward?

“Just,” Fireflight turned and put his hand over Sandstorm’s mouth, smiling a little, “thank you, Sandstorm. It was worth being woken in the middle of a cycle.” His thoughts were still filled with the planet and its rings, and he didn’t notice how Sandstorm seemed flustered. 

“I think I need to go back and get the rest of it though, or I won’t be worth anything on my shift come light cycle, and you need to go rest too!” 

Feeling himself heat even more at the unexpected (though it shouldn’t have been, right?) contact, Sandstorm shrugged his shoulders and rubbed the back of his neck, and could only be glad he was wearing his visor for once because he knew how easy he was to read without it. He just couldn’t get the image of Fireflight’s optics with the glow of the gas giant in them out of his processor! 

“Y-yeah… It’s no problem. Um… I’ll walk you back to your room now, if that’s alright?”

“Sure,” Fireflight yawned and shook his wings even though it wouldn’t help much. He took Sandstorm’s hand and tugged on it until the larger mech started to walk. As much as he wanted his recharge though… he wouldn’t have foregone the vision of the gas giant for anything. 

Once outside his own door he gave his Tarnite friend a quick kiss on the cheek plating and then ducked in, seeking his berth already halfway offline. 

_Fireflight_ didn’t think much of his action at all, but Sandstorm stood outside the white mech’s door, dumbstruck, because he _did_ think something of it. On top of his already out-of-place thoughts, he now had to figure that out? Had Fireflight been one of his own kin, he would know exactly what that kiss meant. But Fireflight was a Vosian and very affectionate besides… But they were friends. Right?

“Frag me…”


	6. Six Geese a Laying

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the sixth day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> six Geese a Laying  
> five Golden Rings  
> four Calling Birds  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

“Oh, they are beautiful!” Fireflight cooed upon opening the box that Sandstorm had just handed him, revealing six glimmering rocks nestled in shallow pockets between tufts of soft, dark mesh. He carefully picked up and rolled one of the nearly spherical rocks around the palm of his hand, admiring the way the crystalline surface caught the light before exchanging it for another one. They were about the size of his closed fist and each had a unique pattern and color scheme, and Fireflight just loved all of them to bits! 

Sandstorm grinned and allowed himself a small gloat, too pleased that his gift was well received to be concerned with acting modest. Giving Fireflight things had become something of an addiction; the high was a direct result of the delight in the Vosian’s expression when he saw what he was given.

“I knew you’d like ‘em. Found ‘em on the outpost we stopped at to refuel but with shifts and all that, I haven’t had a moment to deliver til now.” ‘Now’ being him coated in planetary dust and unsightly dings from the poor weather that had reached a sudden peak a little while ago, forcing them all back inside the ship from their tasks. “Maybe they can make up for the fact that we haven’t seen hardly a wink of each other in a deca?”

“That is not your fault!” Fireflight insisted, shooting down the idea that he even remotely blamed Sandstorm for their time apart before the mech could go any further. He was not particularly mollified towards his family or the other seekers on board (rather the opposite in fact; they were getting on his nerves now more than ever), but as long as they were not saying anything about Sandstorm he kept his temper in check even if not doing so might get the shift coordinator to stop being so difficult about their opposing schedules. That did not mean he was going to let the Tarnite think it was his fault they hardly saw each other! 

Remembering that he was actually supposed to be heading off to one of those aforementioned shifts, the white mech pouted and looked up at his friend apologetically. 

“I do love them, thank you so much!” he said earnestly while he carefully put the stone back in its slot and closed the lid. “I have to run though… I’m really sorry,” and he really was very sorry, “bad weather doesn’t excuse me from monitor duty.” 

He stood on the tips of his pedes to kiss Sandstorm’s cheek plating, then put his new gift in his subspace and hurried off with a cheerfully called farewell. He was gone before Sandstorm could eke out a response, so the Tarnite just stood where he had been left and wondered just what the in the Pit he was getting himself into.

Worse yet, he wondered if he would bother to try to get out of it once he figured it out.

* * *

–Sandstorm!–

Sandstorm jerked at the unexpected sound of Fireflight’s panicked voice and almost looked around before he realized it was his internal comm. and not the actual mech talking to him that had roused him from the stupor he had settled into after their parting earlier that orn. 

–‘Flight?– he replied hesitantly, unsure what to make of the distressed tone. As he shook off the last vestiges of disorientation, he asked, –What’s up? Are you alright?–

–The box is making strange noises, Sand’! It’s making really, really strange noises and the room is all dark and I don’t want to get off the berth while it makes those noises!– Fireflight half babbled, half explained. The sound of cracking and splintering was loud in the inky black silence of his quarters and it was scary, slaggit all! 

“The box…?” Sandstorm mumbled aloud bemusedly as he looked down into his energon, ignoring the weird looks he was given as a response by the mechs chatting at the table next to his. What could possibly be wrong with the box? 

Resolving himself, Sandstorm pushed himself to his pedes and headed for the door. –Give me a klik and I’ll be there, got it?– he ordered as he downed the last of his drink and left the commissary. 

–Yes, sure, it’s being even more noisy now, it sounds like it’s… It’s _growing_.– It really did and Fireflight did not like that notion at all! What if it grew so big it blocked the door? Or squashed him against the wall? Or… –Sandstorm, please hurry! Please, please, please, please!–

–Almost there,– the triple changer said as reassuringly as he could, rounding the corner to the residential block and nearly taking out a couple of Vosian grounders in the process. He barely managed an apology for them before taking off again. 

–Maybe, uh, turn on your landing lights?– he suggested. –It’ll be something to see by, anyway…–

–But I’m in root mode!– Fireflight fairly wailed into the comm., panic beginning to take over from anything resembling rational. There were scratching noises now! Was the box alive?

Sandstorm couldn’t decide if he wanted to grin or grimace at the overly dramatic sound of Fireflight’s distress. On the one hand, he was obviously really upset, but on the other… Well, he was just too adorable, not practical at all about dealing with potential threats but so fragging cute that it didn’t matter. 

–Alright, alright! I’m here anyway,– the orange mech replied instead of voicing any other thoughts, and made quick work of hacking into Fireflight’s room (which they would be hearing about in no time flat, but he wasn’t going to ask Fireflight to open the door now if he hadn’t been able to get up and do it before). He was in and swiping a hand over the light sensor before the door finished cycling open, but was just beyond the door frame when he stopped dead in his tracks at the sight of the box in the now illuminated room.

Or, well, what was _inside_ the box. The rocks were… breaking? And creatures were coming out of them.

“Sandstorm!” Fireflight cried out, but fell silent save for overworked cooling fans, staring at the box and what remained of the pretty rocks. Shards and dust, and six odd… things. Like six legged electrolizards with flappy wings. There was nothing Cybertronian about them whatsoever. In fact, they were very, very organic to look at. 

“…” His vocalizer reset and he rubbed his throat cabling as he calmed somewhat, a feat only possible now that he wasn’t alone. “They are kinda freaky cute?” 

“I’m not sure how to feel about this,” Sandstorm admitted. When he had bought them, he had been under the impression that these things were rocks! Not… this. Whatever ‘this’ was. Eggs, it seemed…

“Um…” What was he supposed to do now?

The Vosian frowned. “They are kinda cute,” he said again, “but I don’t think I want them in my room.” He remembered the cute, bulbous alien birds all too well, after all. He didn’t want anyone to have chunks of them eaten by these things too! He was still on his berth, unsure if it was a good idea to try and unfurl. His wings kinda hurt because he was wedged into the corner where his berth frame was welded to the wall though. 

“What are we going to do with them?” He wiggled a little and then huffed in frustration when he realized he had gotten his wing snagged on something. “Can you help me loose?” 

“Uh… Sure.” Sandstorm stepped up to the berth and only reluctantly took his optics from the weird little squirmy creatures on the table so that he could help Fireflight out of the corner without getting one of his wings bent. “You always manage to get yourself into the strangest of predicaments… I never thought I’d be to blame for one though. Sorry ‘bout this, ‘Flight… I’ll call one of the scientists up and see what we can do with these. Hopefully we won’t have to turn around and take ‘em back, ‘cause that’ll set us back by orns!”

“It’s hardly your fault that the rocks decided to be, well…” Fireflight pouted and waved meaningfully at the creatures that’d ruined both rocks and box pretty well in their bid to hatch. 

“And I bet you they weren’t native to that place either! I certainly didn’t see anything like- _oh-Primus-duck_!” He pushed at Sandstorm and hiked his wings up as one of the creatures took flight from his desk, and his alarm only increased when, as they were tumbling from the berth, their commanding officer burst into the room with a look of doom on his faceplates that quickly changed to terror as the newly aerial creature zipped straight for him with a deafening screech.

Could this orn get any worse?!


	7. Seven Swans-a-Swimming

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the seventh day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> seven Swans a Swimming  
> six Geese a Laying  
> five Golden Rings  
> four Calling Birds  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

It had certainly been an orn he wouldn’t forget in a hurry, Sandstorm mused disdainfully to himself. On their way back from the refuel depot one of their engines had blown out, leaving them stranded in a dead zone between there and their current residence on Stratos Vector-113, so someone had to go out in an emergency shuttle _back_ to the depot so they could get someone to tow them… Gods willing, they might just make it out of this with only a minor setback to schedule, but he really could have done without being put on repair detail when he was supposed to be relaxing. Sure, it was all done now, but still! 

There was a light at the end of the tunnel, however, for when he entered the depot’s lounge he caught sight of a very familiar white frame relaxing on an oversized couch. A grin stole across the Tarnite’s features as he made his way over.

With a self-satisfied huff, Sandstorm hopped over the back of the couch upon reaching it and made himself comfortable right beside his unsuspecting friend. He completely disregarded the fact that he still had smudges of grease and grime all over him as he reached over and nabbed the half full cube from dainty white hands that he noticed were _not_ dirty like most everyone else in the spacious room. 

“Sup, ‘Flight? Where were you?” he asked, not a hint of shame for having stolen the mech’s energon in his tone or body language.

“Grounded,” Fireflight pouted and promptly nestled against his Tarnite friend, but didn’t bother trying to take his cube back. “Apparently I am of no use with delicate equipment.” The pout even showed in his tone. It wasn’t his fault he got distracted! And he certainly had not ever been near the engine at all, so it wasn’t his fault they were stuck… 

And the other seekers wondered why he preferred Sandstorm’s company to theirs? The triple changer never said such hurtful things. 

“I had monitor duty for the most part, and was set to cleaning the rec room for a while after that.”

“Lame,” Sandstorm said soothingly, petting Fireflight’s shoulder as he sipped from his pilfered drink and stared out into the vastness beyond the glass of the space station. “If it makes you feel any better, they tried to crush me with a fuel compressor while we were getting to the engine. I wouldn’t have wanted you around such useless, unobservant mechs anyway.”

“I just want to feel useful,” Firefligt huffed but subsided, relaxing under the petting. He returned to looking out of the window, now actually seeing the vista instead of blindly looking at nothing.

“At least this is pretty. One of the station techs told me to go here and look for the ‘station ghosts’. He said they would come around now because we’re about to pass through a solar wind current or something? Do you know what a station ghost is?”

“Not a clue,” confessed Sandstorm, who was content to just sit and zone out. But it was Fireflight talking and he liked it when Fireflight talked, so he kept the conversation going. “Although I _did_ hear about the solar winds. That’s why we were in such a hurry to get done; the techs didn’t want the bay doors open when it rolls through. Did the mech say what these ghosts look like?”

“No, but he seemed… happy – gleeful, even. He was nice too, chatted with me while he refueled instead of just looking oddly at me. Or laughing…” The mech had made it a little easier to get through what felt like punishment detail. Not as good as Sandstorm, but better than anyone on the ship apart from him!

Sandstorm frowned, abruptly drawn from his dazed mood at the mention of another mech sticking around to have an actual conversation with Fireflight. 

“He sat and talked with you? For how long?” he asked, trying to sound nonchalant and feeling like he failed miserably. It shouldn’t bother him, he had to remind himself, but some stranger talking up Fireflight just didn’t sit well. He knew how other people treated his friend. They were only nice when they wanted something… 

“Yeah, he did ask if I wanted to come to the station bar later, but I said no thanks. I’m going to spend as much time with you as I possibly can while we are grounded!” Fireflight shrugged and nuzzled closer, pout back in his voice. 

Sandstorm’s arm tightened around Fireflight instinctively, welcoming the reassurance that the Vosian still wanted to spend time with him over some suck up. He was definitely going to have to find out who that tech was so he could have a little chat with him later though! 

“But it was nice of him to stay and talk,” Fireflight added a moment later, though he said it quietly. The words were barely past his dermas when something in his peripheral caught his attention and he turned his head back to the huge, one-piece forceglass wall and gasped in surprise. 

“What is _that_?”

The triple changer looked out the window at Fireflight’s prompting and made a curious sound, himself. What _was_ it? 

“Maybe that’s your ghost?” he asked, just as another one of the odd creatures slipped into view. It was a little smaller than the first, but no less weird!

“They do look ethereal…” 

Fireflight stared, venting slowly when another and then yet another of the creatures ‘swam’ past, weaving their way through unseen currents and around one another. They looked like big triangles, he thought, with an outward curve on the flat at the front, and the point at the back elongated and made into a tail at the bottom. There did not seem to be any optics or mouths… or anything like that. But the other two swept back points were clearly the tips of some form of wings. And they glided in the dark, star studded emptiness. Lit as if by internal fire, their wing edges streamed light in what looked like a shower of sparks that dragged after them like a faint ghostly trail and then dissipated. 

“That they do,” Sandstorm agreed, all thoughts of the tech (and the bad mood that had been brewing because of him) gone. Another two creatures appeared, the biggest of all, with one very small one between them, and Sandstorm was certain it was a family unit of some sort. “What would you give to see one of _those_ up close?”

“I… Oh, I don’t know! It would be wonderful, but I’d have to fly with them, I wouldn’t want to try and take something like that away from out there…” They were breathtaking; he couldn’t even call them cute! No, something that beautiful wasn’t cute, not even the tiny baby one. It was just as beautiful and graceful as the adults…

“I hope no one captures them! I couldn’t bear to see them in a tiny space. They are like the Winglords, made to fly the winds, free of all restraint… well, the solar winds anyway!” 

“I have a feeling they wouldn’t take well to an attempt to capture them, so I think they’re safe. No doubt those sparks aren’t just for show, you know?” the triple changer said, looking them all over as they wove their way through the passing solar winds. “Given the proper insulation, even one with armor as thin as yours should be able to go out for a couple of breems without risk of freezing up… Maybe an adventure for another orn?” That would be fun, Sandstorm thought. And worth the hassle, just for the excitement on Fireflight’s face!

“Maybe, right now this is adventure enough for me,” Fireflight replied as he wiggled a little and then settled against Sandstorm again with a contented huff. 

Right here with Sandstorm, watching the seven magnificent space faring creatures glide on the solar winds… What could be better?


	8. Eight Maids a Milking

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the eighth day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> eight Maids a Milking  
> seven Swans a Swimming  
> six Geese a Laying  
> five Golden Rings  
> four Calling Birds  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

“It hurts!” Fireflight whimpered when the medic none-too-gently pierced a small, fist-sized boil just above his hip. Much as he fought to keep his wings still so as not to annoy the medic further as the siphon drained the boil, the appendages kept twitching downward and it knocked the needle out. He couldn’t help it; it was very hard to stay still when it hurt so much! And he wasn’t used to his plating feeling that way, as if it was under pressure, either. The sensation was sort of heavy and made his gyros act all out of whack. He hated it! 

“Of course it hurts! You could have flown the other way!” the medic snapped as he smacked the offending wing and put the needle back in. Fireflight flinched a little and swallowed another whimper. He didn’t dare mention that no, he really could not have! If he had, then that little grounder geologist would have been stung multiple times and that would have been much worse with how small he was. 

That was the argument that Sandstorm heard upon entering the medbay. He had hurried there as quick as he could after he was done with his shift of monitor duty ended because he had seen them bringing Fireflight in, and it made his energon boil to think that someone had let the young Vosian get injured. He needed to make sure that Fireflight was alright for himself, not listen to weak words of reassurance from some absolute lug of an officer that didn’t want him anywhere near his friend.

Without waiting for approval from the medic (not that he rightly cared what anyone might have to say – he wasn’t here for anyone but Fireflight), he squeezed his way in between exam tables so that he could get to the mech that was facing away from him. The injuries looked even worse up close, and Sandstorm had to refrain from grimacing as he snapped his mask and visor off and slid them into his subspace before kneeling down to be optic level with the smaller mech.

“Hey, there,” he greeted. “Injured again, huh? Between the two of us, we always manage to end up in here somehow… What happened?” He wanted to poke one of the weird looking boils, but knew that would be a terrible idea and so didn’t.

“Sandstorm,” Fireflight tried to smile but knew that the expression came off somewhat weakly. 

“There was some… some insectoids and they stung some mechs, and there was that little geologist, you know him? He was right in the middle of it and I had to cover him, I couldn’t just let him be stung!” There was pleading in both the big golden optics and the shaking of his voice. If anyone was going to believe him and trust it was his better judgment, it would be Sandstorm. 

“But they strung me when I tried to chase them off. They got me… lots of places and it really hurts something fierce, and I don’t like it! And the medics say they have to drain the fluids and it is gross, Sanders, it’s really painful and gross and I don’t want to be here. I really, really don’t like to be here,” he whimpered openly again. 

Ignoring the glare he got from the medic, Sandstorm grabbed one of the fold away stools and made himself well and truly comfortable at Fireflight’s berth side. He took one pale hand in his own and offered a smile. 

“Well, much as I hate seeing you injured, at least you had a good reason… But by the gods, ‘Flight, you sure gave me a scare when they had to carry you in!” ‘Scare’ was probably too light of a word for the terror that had struck him for a moment when the camera angled toward the dock had first shown him Fireflight, laid out motionless and injured he knew not how much… But he couldn’t bring himself to tell Fireflight anything more than that. Not here, not now… Maybe not ever. It felt like admitting too much so he just squeezed the Vosian’s hand lightly and tried for another smile.

“It hurt so much after the third sting that I crashed,” Fireflight admitted weakly, but was cut off by a light smack (that still hurt quite a bit) that made him hike his wings up again with a quiet squeak. He felt like he had shamed all the Seekers on board by crashing… Pit! Sometimes he felt like he shamed them just by being there at all! None of them liked him because he was clumsy and talked too much; all the mechs he talked with regularly were grounders or not-Vosian fliers. 

And Sandstorm. 

The Tarnite was his main, and sometimes only, solace and reason for forging ahead when he had a bad, bad orn. Because Sandstorm believed in him, understood him and was always willing to listen to him. 

He whimpered when his wing was smacked again and ducked his helmet, squeezing Sandstorm’s hands hard. This medic wasn’t very nice at all! 

Petting Fireflight’s hand softly, Sandstorm glowered at the medic. “Hit him again and you’ll be the next one needing fixed,” he growled. “I may not be one of the medical staff, but even I know that isn’t necessary for what you’re supposed to be doing.”

“If he’d keep those damn wings still, I’d be able to do my job!” 

Fireflight ducked his head further, wondering what he had ever done to the snarly medic. Maybe he just didn’t like Seekers… Maybe he just didn’t like him for giving him annoying work like this. Or it could be something else entirely and it really didn’t matter because–

“Sandstorm, I need to purge, I, like now, like could yo-urgh.” He bit down on his hand, trying to keep it down until a receptacle of some sort could be found. He was unpopular enough already, he didn’t need to add this to his list of transgressions! 

It only took a moment to find a container, and Sandstorm was glad for that because it was just as he was getting the small tub under Fireflight that the mech couldn’t hold his last meal down any longer. As gross as it was though, he held the bucket and pet Fireflight as he retched and gasped without flinching and pulled a cloth from subspace to wipe the Vosian’s mouth when he finally seemed to be done.

“Feel better?” he asked softly, then shoved the liquid filled tub at the medic none-too-gently and directed a pointed look at him as he snarled, “Your patient, your mess. Deal with that.” 

“N-not really,” Fireflight moaned miserably, gyros still spinning and everything still hurting. Now his tank and throat tubing hurt too! 

“And a fragging fine mess indeed,” the medic sneered uncharitably at the triple changer before carrying off the waste. Fireflight flinched a little at the tone and tried to hide his faceplates in Sandstorm’s hand. He just wanted things to stop hurting and then he wanted… then he wanted to be held and told that he’d done the right thing! Instead of being here, being snarled at and hurting!

Once the medic was out of the way, Sandstorm leaned over and rested his helm on the Vosian’s downturned cranial unit. “It’ll be okay. But if that slagger hits you again I’m going to deck him and I want you to say you didn’t see anything, alright? He has no right to treat you that way…”

“I won’t tell on you,” Fireflight said, surprised but gratified at his friend’s vehemence. “You don’t have to hit him though; I just want these… these boils drained and stop hurting. Then I can go and recharge… That would be nice…” 

Nuzzling into the blessedly cool and steady hand, he asked quietly, “Can you stay for a while? I feel better when you are here…” 

“Whatever you want. I’m here as long as you need me. I’m not going anywhere.” Sandstorm kissed Fireflight’s helm lightly and stared down the medic when he came back, daring him to say anything.


	9. Nine Ladies Dancing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the ninth day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> nine Ladies Dancing  
> eight Maids a Milking  
> seven Swans a Swimming  
> six Geese a Laying  
> five Golden Rings  
> four Calling Birds  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

It was something of a relief to leave the planet that had the insectoids that caused allergic reactions whenever they stung Fireflight (which ended up being a total of eight times, for goodness sake!), and Sandstorm celebrated by barging in on Fireflight in the wash racks and saying, “C’mon, we’re going on an adventure!”

“Eep!” Fireflight squealed and nearly elevated off the floor, turbines spinning with takeoff readiness at the fright. He whirled around and was about to snap when he registered just who it was that had snuck up on him.

“Sandstorm! What in Primus’ name… wait, adventure? Where, why? Don’t you think I should stay in the ship for a while?” Plenty of mechs kept saying that to him after his accidental enmity with the last world’s stinging insectoids, and he was inclined to believe them for once!

“Sorry. And… Well, it’s kind of like an adventure,” the triple changer said, having the good grace to look sheepish about his over exaggeration. “We’re not going far, just up to the bridge. The navigator was messing with the course projection and found out we’re about to get front row seats to a planet alignment! He was saying at least seven when I left including the one we just got off of, but maybe even as much as nine or ten planets will be participating.”

“Ooh! Hang on, I just gotta rinse and stuff…” Fireflight grinned and nodded, ducking back under the spray to rinse off quickly. Once done, he set the dryer to nearly uncomfortably hot so it would be over quickly and stepped into the stream of air, rotating slowly. Polishing… Nope, that would have to wait!

Within moments he was finished to his own satisfaction and he hurried to collect his supplies before bouncing over to Sandstorm by the door. “Come on, I’m ready!”

Laughing at his friend’s exuberance, Sandstorm nodded and did a smart about face to head back out, but not without waiting long enough that Fireflight could latch onto his arm. “You didn’t need to rush so much, you know. It’s not like it’s happening right this instant…”

“Meh! This way we’ll perhaps manage to get a good spot at the view ports, right?” Fireflight giggled and wiggled his wings. “And I can live with skipping on the polish once, it’s not like I’ll be noticed in the rush to see this!”

“My, is that vanity I hear?” Sandstorm couldn’t help but tease, eyeing Fireflight’s wings as they moved back and forth. He resisted reaching over to touch one of the twitching appendages, but his vocalizer wasn’t quite so restrained. “You can’t actually _want_ these idiots to look at you and your pretty polished wings.”

“Oh, stop it! No, I don’t… I don’t like any of them nearly enough to want that, and besides I feel no connection to any of them either.” Fireflight sighed a little and his wings drooped. “I knew the chance of finding a trine mate on a small ship like this, or even on one of the stations or other ships we might meet was a long shot. But you can hope right? It would just be trine call, but it would be something, and maybe then my family wouldn’t be so fraggin’ overprotective of me!”

“I take it they still don’t like me?” No surprise there… Sandstorm wasn’t so sure recently if he liked himself. Not where Fireflight was concerned… “You shouldn’t rush it, either way. They just care about you and are worried, I’m sure.”

“They don’t like anyone that I like, it’s like they think I’ll just lie back and…” he started, but stopped himself and concentrated on venting for a moment. A frustrated groan followed afterward despite Fireflight’s attempt at having calmed down. “You know what I mean!” 

“Anyway, we can talk about that later, we’re nearly there…” And he really did not want to rant in front of most of the crew. Anyone who could get off shift in time would be there to gawk, he was sure of it.

“Sure, of course,” Sandstorm said agreeably. He knew it was a touchy subject, after all, and he didn’t want to upset Fireflight. Quite the opposite, really!

They entered the bridge a moment later, and sure enough it was filling up quick. The triple changer took the lead then, his greater mass making it much easier to navigate through the throngs to what he thought would be a good vantage point near the helm. Fireflight was small even for a Vosian, and no one was cooperative with him anyway.

“Looks like it’s a good thing you rushed, huh?” he joked, eyeing the growing crowd. Sometimes it was so easy to forget they even had this many mechs onboard! 

“Told you so,” Fireflight grinned cheekily, and ignored the looks and wing movements of a group of nearby seekers. It was not their fragging business anyway!

The open comm. line crackled to life a couple of breems after they were settled and the voice of the navigator’s apprentice filtered through, saying, –Everyone! It’s about to start; please look to the right, where we can see the beautiful iron planet, Aethos, coming into alignment with its much bigger counterpart, Freeot…– Everyone was immediately shifted to look out of the huge right viewport. They were right at the heliopause of the system and the pilots had gotten the ship up so that they were looking down at the ‘disk’ shape of the solar system. From here it was very visible that the planets were about to align…

“...Six… eight… nine!” Fireflight exclaimed, as quietly as he could, and pointed at the sun, a tiny one compared to their own Hadeen. “With the primary it makes all nine not including the dwarf planets!”

“Yeah, nine… Wow…” It truly was stunning and Sandstorm figured he could blame his lack of processing power on that. Not the fact that Fireflight was being forced closer to him because of the crowd pressing in for a better view of the phenomenon on the other side of the viewport. “Almost makes the trip to this galaxy worth it.” But only almost. He still wasn’t impressed with Fireflight’s sicknesses or the treatment he had gotten during them.

“Oh shush,” Fireflight giggled a little and pointed at the smallest world, close to the primary.

“That one; look at it! I have never seen a solid planetary body that was purple before.” they were all pretty, like gems on a chain… Vosian jewelry involved a lot of chains, and such were not far from Fireflight’s processor. He did like his shinies.

“Brown, rust, green even – but that one looks like purple crystal!”

Sandstorm made a curious sound and nodded. “It does, doesn’t it? Nice rich purple like that… Kinda like the tepaki crystals around the aerodome in Vos, huh? Same shape and everything.”  
“Ye… you have been to Vos?” Fireflight craned his head around and looked up at Sandstorm with some surprise. Their home cities had never come up in conversation; there were plenty of other things to talk about out here after all! That made this previously unknown fact all the more exciting for him to inquire after.

“Oh, you know. Once or twice,” Sandstorm replied flippantly, though inwardly he was pleased at Fireflight’s interest. “I wasn’t always part of interplanetary surveillance, right? I had different jobs before this one, and I’m not proud of all of them so let’s leave it at that for now and enjoy the show.”

“Once or twice,” Fireflight mimicked, but let himself be diverted, mulling this new information over as he watched the graceful choreography of aligning planets. It was like professional dancers spinning slowly into place: beautiful in its subtlety and flawless in its execution.


	10. Ten Lords-a-Leaping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the tenth day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> ten Lords a Leaping  
> nine Ladies Dancing  
> eight Maids a Milking  
> seven Swans a Swimming  
> six Geese a Laying  
> five Golden Rings  
> four Calling Birds  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

Fireflight descended on Sandstorm when he found him in the commissary, all grins and eager smugness as he took the orange mech’s hand. “You have to come with me!” was all he said as he began pulling on the triple changer; he didn’t even try to disguise how his turbines spun or how his wings fluttered with utterly gleeful emotions. 

“Are we going on an adventure?” Sandstorm asked playfully, but he allowed himself to be dragged away from the admittedly boring task of listening to a group of grounders complain about the terrain of the planet they were on without a fight. It wasn’t like he had their problem, being a triple changer and therefore capable of overcoming both land and air obstacles with relative ease… 

“Depends; you said you’ve been to Vos, but I bet you haven’t seen what we are about to see!” Fireflight all but chortled, doubly gleeful that no one could accuse him of insulting Zephyrus because Sandstorm was a Tarnite and had all the right in the world to watch the ritual!

“You really do remember the things I say!” the triple changer teased as they rounded a corner. “I’m honored. But I am curious about this thing we’re going to see… You gonna tell me about it or do I have to wait?”

“We’re here, so you can see for yourself.” Fireflight bared his dentals at the Seeker outside the rec room that they had stopped in front of, but the mech didn’t even try to stop them. He didn’t try not to look annoyed either, but beggars could not be choosers. Sandstorm would likely not be the only Tarnite here though. There were a few others and they would be invited out of courtesy for their patron god. It was tradition… 

“See?” He nodded to the screen even as he dragged Sandstorm towards an unoccupied seating arrangement big enough to hold the triple changer. 

Sandstorm looked over the exclusively ‘flier’ filled room with increasing curiosity but decided to keep his questions to himself. He trusted Fireflight to explain if he didn’t understand after whatever they were supposed to see. And what they were supposed to see was… A group of Seekers? No… Nobles. He recognized a couple of the family crests. 

Okay, just one question, he amended himself after they had settled into seats facing the screen. “Is this a transmission from home?”

“Mhmm,” Fireflight nodded and grinned cheekily. “It’s the representative lords of the noble houses… Most of them young and untrined. Haven’t you seen the central plaza?” He tilted his head, pointing to the tower rising behind the lords. “The winglords’ aerie? And there, the twin temples.” 

“Ah, yes… It’s been a long time, but I can’t forget the temples. Lovely to visit, not so much friendly staff… Although my intrusion wasn’t exactly optimal, but meh. Whatever.” The triple changer shrugged and leaned back. Judging from the quality, it wasn’t a live transmission, but a recording… Not surprising. What Vosian would allow a display to be transmitted in low quality when everyone knew a recording would take a little longer but look _much_ better? Vain creatures, Vosians were.

“Oh? Usually the priests are very nice.” Fireflight hummed lowly, thinking back. He’d never had a bad experience in the temples, and he knew a few priests he would not mind having helping when he wanted his seals gone. If he didn’t go into heat first of course… Then it would pretty much be a moot point. 

Shaking his head to banish those thoughts, Fireflight got back on topic. “Anyway, this is the skydance; the recording came in a few joor ago and we’ve all been excused from duty to see it. It’s not like being there of course,” it really was not and Fireflight’s tone got a bit melancholic, “but it’s going to be so good to see it anyway!” 

“Ooh…” That was one thing Sandstorm couldn’t say he had ever seen. Sure, he had been invited to similar events before simply because he was a… Oh, what did they call him and his kind? Part-time whirligig? But he had never taken up the offer, finding himself much more interested in whatever he was doing at the time to bother. Briefly, the triple changer wondered why he was sticking around this time but deep down, he knew he didn’t need to wonder. He was amenable to just about anything a certain someone asked of him these orns…

Thankfully, Sandstorm’s attention was drawn outward and away from his thoughts again as a hush swept through the room a moment later, signifying that the show was about to start. Ten nobles in total were all lined up on their glorious pedestals atop the aerie, each making final preparations before settling into statuesque poses of self-assurance and dominance, just waiting for the signal to begin. 

“See, this vorn there are only ten old enough to participate that are either not trined yet, or trined but not mated, some vorn it has been almost a hundred…” Fireflight spoke as low as he could, explaining what he thought might be important. He didn’t know what non-Vosians were normally told, but Tarn was their closest ally apart from Kaon, perhaps even closer than Kaon. He could see nothing wrong with explaining things to Sandstorm. 

“It’s a fertility ritual… and a celebration of what’s to come. The Heat will begin soon for those old enough that the coding activated,” he explained. “Likely within a couple of groons if this ritual is being posed now.” Fireflight wondered when he would be mature enough for that, but didn’t add it to his explanation. He still had the overly large optics of a youngling, but sometimes that took a long time to fade so it was no indicator. Maybe it would be this vorn? He bit his derma. He wanted it but at the same time, he didn’t… “These ten probably all have at least one potential trine mate found, maybe have even met their mate but it hasn’t been made official yet.” 

“I guess that explains the huge turnout for the show… It’s even bigger than I thought.” It kind of made Sandstorm regret missing out on it before, but the feeling was fleeting as he gave half an audio to the commentator on screen presenting each noblemech. He got to see Vosians fly all the time – how much different could a choreographed display be?

“Oh, no, the turnout is because it’s a holyorn for us, like a big, big party! It’s a celebration of mating and of sparklings and younglings,” Fireflight giggled. “Fertility, as I said! All the sparklings and younglings will be treated all orn. Strangers will give them small presents and candies, and no one is to work on this orn so that we can devote all our energies toward this. It is a fantastic event; the dance of the winglords is… I don’t know how to explain it in the common language. A prayer? Yes, maybe… A prayer to Zephyrus and Tempestas, of course, and to the holy triad. But most of all it is a prayer to Prima and Spítha, to look on the coming groon with kind optics and the want to bless us with new sparklings.”

Sometimes, Fireflight made it so easy to forget that Vosians were highly cultural with how flighty and carefree he was. He rarely talked about their traditions, after all, same as most of his kind. But not this time, and Sandstorm couldn’t help but boggle slightly at the in depth explanation even as he tried to soak it all in. All that, kicked off by this one dance?

“Kinda makes me feel like I’m invading now… I didn’t realize this was so important to you,” he admitted quietly. 

“How can you be invading when I asked you to come? That’s silly, Sandstorm! And you are a Tarnite, besides. Your kin are always welcome at the celebrations in Vos!” Well, most of them. During Heat, most mechs from outside were asked to leave the high traffic areas, and preferably the city-state entirely. It was for their safety. 

“Anyway, this is an open celebration; I know the Winglord would like more outsiders to come to it. To see how much we love our littles, so they can see another side of us than all those stories of frightful winged mercenaries!”

At that, Sandstorm couldn’t help but laugh. “You think I don’t know you love your littles? With how protective your brothers are of you, and how much you, personally, coo over anything small and adorable…” He shook his head, still smiling, but the expression turned serious again as he strove to explain himself. “But I meant more… The celebration? Everything that it stands for… That’s something I don’t get to participate in, you know? Tarnites don’t have the coding for Heat. It seems unfair to bear witness to something that I don’t fully understand and can never partake in. Like I’d be taking something away from the ones it’s actually for, if that makes any sense?”

“Well, it’s not a never ever, you know? It’s not likely… but it’s not a never ever. Who knows! You might be the resonant to one of the winglords, or, well, anyone? How would you know?” Fireflight giggled at the idea, heat tainting his cheek plating. He, like any other Seeker, was intrigued by the idea of having a resonant or knowing one. It wasn’t very likely though, that he would find one or that Sandstorm would be one. 

It was simply that the chance was there! 

“And we want mechs to come, to participate and learn. It would be fantastic if more Seekers could find mates, resonants! Just… well, just imagine all the little sparklings!” 

“Ha! That’ll be the orn… I ever tell you that I love how optimistic you are? You always find the silver lining of a situation.” Sandstorm leaned over to bump the Vosian gently. “And you always come back to cute things. Why weren’t you an instructor again? You adore sparklings, I’m sure you would make a great caregiver or fledgling educator.”

“Naw, I… I want to see everything!” Fireflight shook his helmet, avoiding Sandstorm’s optics. He didn’t want to take care of sparklings… not yet, not till he found trine and mate. Then maybe, when he had seen enough, when they had seen enough… He would live for a long, long time after all! 

Or he planned to at least… 

“And I like cute things, that’s no crime, is it?” he faked a pout and glanced up at his friend. 

“Hey, don’t gimme that look,” Sandstorm said, putting a hand over Fireflight’s overly large optics as if shielding himself from them. “It’s not a crime, but that pout of yours should be!” That was for damn sure! Frag fledglings and their adorable optics… Fireflight used his to their maximum potential and it about drove him nuts!

He glanced away from Fireflight and toward the screen in time to see the first of the Winglords finally take off, leaping into the air and firing his thrusters in perfect time at some unknown signal, and said, “Oh, it’s begun!”

“Silly!” Fireflight pushed the hand away and shifted to fit against Sandstorm as he curled up to watch the dance of the winglords. It was always stirring, though he was pretty sure the older seekers meant it differently than he understood it as of yet. 

He wanted to fly with them even if fully adult seekers seemed to want to do… well, each other. 

Sandstorm just grinned and sat back, allowing Fireflight to maneuver them as he pleased as he watched the show on screen. He had to admit that it was a _little_ better than just the random flying he saw on an ornly basis… But only a little. Although judging from the reactions of some mechs around them, not everyone shared his opinion on the matter. 

Actually, looking back on what Fireflight told him about it being a fertility ritual, he could kind of understand. Still, he had to be sure he wasn’t completely off the mark, and once the recording was done and everyone parted ways for recharge or duty or, well, the gods only knew what else (but Sandstorm had a fairly good idea), he pulled the smaller Vosian away from nosey audio receptors and asked, “So… That show. It was basically like Vosian softcore pornography, wasn’t it?”

“It was… what?” Fireflight flickered his optics and gaped at the triple changer with open confusion. Oh, he knew what porn was, of course he did, but the rest of the question didn’t really make much sense to him. 

“I don’t know what that is? But if it means something interfacing related then yes, for fully adult seekers it is supposedly very arousing,” he shrugged and wiggled his wings in a rather lewd manner, “it gets the circuits tingling!”

Trying to ignore the urge to still Fireflight’s wings so they didn’t distract him like they were wont to do when they twitched like that, Sandstorm said, “Softcore is like… Well, not the graphic interfacing bit. Like foreplay, I guess? I’m just… a little confused as to why you wanted me to watch porn with you, I think.”

“Um, no, no, no!” Fireflight laughed, genuinely amused now that he had a better grasp of the question. “It really wasn’t porn! It is a prayer to the gods and goddesses, and yeah, it involves a fair bit of teasing and rousing, but it is meant to be a beautiful thing, something to share and rejoice in. That’s why I wanted you to see it. It’s a beautiful show of skills.” 

He paused and then giggled some more. Rather matter-of-factly, he added, “If I wanted to watch porn with you I’d have invited you to watch any of the Vosian movies and plays I have recording of,” the giggle turned into a snicker, “but I didn’t know you were interested in fliers going at it?” 

Sandstorm straightened up, feeling more surprised than he thought he should at the fact that Fireflight actually owned something with pornographic content. He _was_ a Vosian, after all… But surprised he was, and all he could think to say was, “I’m really not sure how to feel about that, except, um, I’m a flier too. Why wouldn’t I like them? Just because of the model difference?” 

“Sandstorm,” Fireflight broke into gales of laughter, wings fluttering with mirth. Trust the mech not to get that he was teasing him! And he looked so dumbstruck too, not insulted, but completely and utterly poleaxed at the idea that he might not find fliers attractive.

“I-it was a j-joke! I’ve seen you look, Zephyrus! Sandstorm, I may not have active coding, but I’m not blind either. Oooh, I am sure you been in a few berths while on the Axiom! And I sincerely hoped you enjoyed being in them.” 

Sandstorm had done all of the above, both before and after meeting Fireflight, but that was not something he had ever thought would be brought up in conversation with the Vosian… Pit, interfacing at all wasn’t something he thought they would talk about! Sliding a hand over his face as if that would wipe away the unexpected and unwelcome flush, the triple changer laughed a little at himself. Yet another fine mess he was getting himself into, he could tell…At least Fireflight didn’t know the real reason he was so shell shocked.

“Oh, ‘Flight… You never cease to amaze,” he said while reaching out his free hand to give his friend a light shove. “I learn something new about you every orn, you know that? One orn I think you’re so innocent and sweet and the next, you’re poking fun at me!”

“If you say so,” Fireflight laughed, dodging the shove and fluttering happily. This was more like it! As fun as Sandstorm had looked all shocked and such, this was more like his friend. Much, much better!


	11. Eleven Pipers Piping

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the eleventh day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> eleven Pipers Piping  
> ten Lords a Leaping  
> nine Ladies Dancing  
> eight Maids a Milking  
> seven Swans a Swimming  
> six Geese a Laying  
> five Golden Rings  
> four Calling Birds  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

Too busy with everything happening around him to pay attention to his own body’s cues, Fireflight didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary with himself over the next few groons. Between his (still not approved of) friendship with Sandstorm, his work as a scout for the exploration ship, and getting into and out of trouble, he just didn’t have time! 

To him, things were as they had been since Sandstorm rescued him from the hugging tree. 

And then one orn, completely out of the blue, the call came. 

It was immediately broadcast throughout the ship, followed by an announcement that they were going to return to Cybertron. 

Fireflight didn’t hear the announcement though; his wings were high and stiff and his processor was reeling with new and confusing information. 

Sandstorm, from where he was lying on the floor of Fireflight’s room, looked up from the game he had been contemplating with a frown. “What’s that all about? We’re not scheduled to return for almost two groons still!” he groused. Immediately after the weird announcement, he had signed into the ship’s log to see if it was a legitimate decision, but he was stopped from pursuing the information when he saw the confused look on Fireflight’s faceplates.

“Fireflight?” he prompted, reaching over to poke the Seeker’s pede gently.

“Um… What?” Fireflight came back to himself with a start, optics flickering a little. “I’m sorry, were you talking to me?” 

“I was complaining… But what was with that music, you think? It sounded like a small band suddenly took up… And then the announcement that we’re going home?” Sandstorm pushed himself up off his belly and into a kneeling position, looking Fireflight over. “Are you alright?”

“What music?” Fireflight frowned and shook his helmet. “I’m fine I think? Just startled, I… we are being called home to Vos, the Seekers on board, I mean.” For the Heat, his still reeling processor supplied internally. It was never entirely predictable when it would begin each vorn, only that it would be in the latter half, mostly the latter quarter, and that certain signs when observed caused a worldwide, and beyond, recall of all Seekers with active mating coding. This was the first time in his life that Fireflight had understood the recall message as anything more than gibberish in the Winglord of Vos’ voice. And that was startling because that meant his mating codes were online enough that he was ready to participate in the Heat. 

Well, so much for asking a nice priest for help with his seals… 

Sandstorm’s frown only deepened as his confusion mounted. “The music right before the announcement, ‘Flight. You had to have heard it… Wait, what do you mean, you’re being called back to Vos? No one said anything about Vos!” 

“There wasn’t any music? It was the Winglord calling all adult Seekers back to Vos for the Heat cycle, I heard him clear as anything!” Fireflight said as he frowned again with confusion, trying to think about the form of the message. It had been short, but… but he felt like he’d listened to a long speech… “I don’t know. I just know we’re being called back to Vos! I haven’t done this before, you know, I didn’t even know I’d be mature enough this time.” The Vosian fidgeted, a little bit apprehensive all of a sudden. 

“No, no, there was definitely music…” the triple changer insisted before trailing off. He didn’t recall hearing the Winglord at all, only the comm. officer after that strange musical bit. Still, he couldn’t help but change the subject slightly in favor of more immediate concerns, asking, “You mean you think this is all about the Heat cycle? Maybe your overactive imagination is taking its toll on you…”

In response, Fireflight picked up a pillow and smacked Sandstorm in the face with it before turning his back on him, curling up with his wings held stiff and angry. “You go and ask the helmsmech if we are not speeding back to Vos this very moment, then if it’s not true you can make stupid jokes about my imagination!” 

It wasn’t really the joke that upset him; he _did_ have an overactive imagination and Sandstorm didn’t mean his words as ridicule. But… well, he didn’t really want to grow all the way up right now! Everything would change after the Heat. Everyone always said that everything changed after your first Heat! He didn’t want things to change; he didn’t want things to stop just so he could start on something new… 

“Oof!” Sandstorm grunted, surprised at the force of the hit. He pushed the pillow aside and sighed heavily through his vents when he saw Fireflight’s back turned to him.

“Hey… Come on, ‘Flight, don’t be like that…” he pleaded while moving forward on his knees. He wrapped his arms around the Vosian and leaned against him just heavily enough to be felt. “I believe you, if you’re gonna act like this about it! Turn around and let’s talk about this like normal. Please?”

“Why? There’s nothing to talk about. It’s gunna happen either way,” Fireflight huffed gustily, wings drooping. He’d already forgotten his anger, feelings going in just about every other direction there was. Having active coding would be a good thing, for the most part. But the change… The other Seekers would react to him differently! He didn’t even have a trine yet, and if he had thought everyone butting in on his friendship with Sandstorm before annoying before, well, he just knew it would be worse now! Oh Zephyrus and Tempestas! There would be nothing but trouble from everyone _now_. Nosiness and mean spirited questions and jabs all the time. 

Why couldn’t everyone just mind their own fragging business and let him be friends with the ones he liked?

“Maybe so, but you know you can still talk to me, right? I wasn’t trying to make fun of you. You know that, don’t you?” Sandstorm asked the smaller mech. He nuzzled Fireflight’s helmet and made a low sound in his vocalizer. “Talk to me. It’s not going to be that bad, is it?”

“It’s going to change everything!” Fireflight wailed. He turned a little to look at Sandstorm without breaking the embracee, optics wide with a mix of fear and wonder. 

“I knew it would happen sometime, but… but does it have to be already? This is only my first tour with a ship, I just met you, and now everything is going to change. I’m not ready for that!” 

Oh… Sandstorm sighed and sat back, pulling Fireflight with him so the smaller mech was curled comfortably in his lap. Of course he would be worried about something like that… Life was so much simpler as a youngling. He had forgotten what it felt like to have so little to worry about. 

“Not everything will change, you know… I’ll still be your friend. That doesn’t ever have to change if you don’t want it to. That’s something, right?”

“That’s true…” Fireflight huffed again and reached up to hug the larger mech’s neck. Sandstorm was a constant, he had said so himself. That… comforted him. In a way he could not put into words, from that first moment when the other had yanked him out of the hugging tree and he had landed on him, tree sap and all… Sandstorm’s presence was soothing. He giggled a little at the memory and burrowed himself in the orange mech’s arms. 

“I love you, you know that? You’re still as awesome as the orn I met you!” 

Those words made Sandstorm ache in a strange way that he wasn’t quite ready to acknowledge, so he simply held Fireflight tighter. “Likewise, Fireflight. So cheer up, okay? It won’t be all bad. And who knows? Maybe you’ll like interfacing so much that you’ll forget all about being upset about it.”

“Silly, it’s not the interfacing part I dislike,” Fireflight said with a shake of his head. Despite his words, Fireflight nevertheless let Sandstorm’s nearness and touch soothe his agitation. Things would turn out alright; the Tarnite was right about that! They could tackle whatever came at them because they were the best friends in the whole universe after all!


	12. Twelve Drummers Drumming

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> On the twelfth day of Christmas  
> my true love sent to me:  
> twelve Drummers Drumming  
> eleven Pipers Piping  
> ten Lords a Leaping  
> nine Ladies Dancing  
> eight Maids a Milking  
> seven Swans a Swimming  
> six Geese a Laying  
> five Golden Rings  
> four Calling Birds  
> three French Hens  
> two Turtle Doves  
> and a Partridge in a Pear Tree

It took a strangely short time to make it back to Cybertron after the announcement of the impending Heat cycle, and Sandstorm was actually glad of it. The air was tense among many of the older Vosians on the ship; they spoke in hushed whispers to one another frequently and avoided outsiders, and a couple of them had even been quarantined in the brig for being ‘hypersensitive’, whatever _that_ meant. They weren’t in trouble and everyone was repeatedly assured of that, but it still put most of the others on edge. The officers said it was more for the Seekers’ own safety than anyone else’s. Nevertheless, it was something of a relief to be told they would be landing in Vos within the joor and every non-Vosian would be escorted out on skimmers, thus taking them away from the madness that would soon ensue.

His only regret was that he wouldn’t see Fireflight for at least a groon. They had barely been apart since their first meeting and… Well, he was feeling selfish. He didn’t _want_ to leave Fireflight’s side. He tried to tell himself that it was only because this would be the first Heat the mech had ever participated in and he didn’t want some processor fritzed idiot ruining it for him, but slag, who was he kidding anymore?

He knew what he really wanted, and it wasn’t nearly so altruistic.

With a low growl of irritation at himself, Sandstorm shoved the rest of his belongings into his subspace and gave his room one last glance to be sure he hadn’t missed anything before heading out and toward Fireflight’s quarters. He would at least say good bye before they had to part ways for a while!

* * *

Fireflight was… bothered. Every seeker on board was ‘bothered’, but he felt it like he was growing again. Itching for an upgrade. Of course he knew he wasn’t, that this was different; this was something much less physical than the need for an upgrade. It also annoyed him that he, all of them, had been told to stay in their quarters until they had landed and the non-Vosian crew had disembarked. He couldn’t say goodbye to Sandstorm that way! 

He was pacing between his berth and the desk restlessly when the door chime went off, nearly making him jump right out of his own chassis in surprise. Fireflight hurried to answer the summons. Maybe it meant he could get out! He would really, really~

“Oh! Sandstorm!” he squeaked when the door revealed his friend instead of a senior Seeker. He was only stunned an astrosecond, then he grinned. “Ohh, are you staying? Did you come to say goodbye? Why are you here? Can you stay?” 

“‘Good bye’ sounds so final… More like a ‘see you in a little while’?” Sandstorm replied sheepishly as he nudged Fireflight back so he could enter and close the door behind him. He knew well the order to not talk to the mech until after the Heat had passed, but frag that!

He wrapped his arms around the smaller mech in a tight hug once they were inside and the door was closed properly, engine rumbling in satisfaction at the simple contact. 

“I can’t stay long; they’ll be calling us out in just a few. But I didn’t want you to think I’d forgotten about you!”

“Well, goodbye for now, I mean. It’s not as if the ship isn’t leaving again, we’re on a schedule and stuff, contracts! I don’t care what happens, I want to go back out…” Fireflight snuggled into the hug and clung tight, babbling and not caring. He didn’t have much to say, but as long as he talked no one would call Sandstorm away. Sparkling logic, but again he did not care. 

But of course, the sparkling’s logic was faulty and soon enough the call for the non-Vosians to depart went out over the ship-wide comm. and on private comm. frequencies too, probably. Fireflight was a very unhappy Seeker as he let go of his friend, spark itself revolting at the separation. 

Sandstorm tried to smile for Fireflight’s benefit as he pulled away, but the expression faltered and then died at the sad frown on the Vosian’s faceplates. 

“Aww, ‘Flight… Don’t make that face!” he said, hands coming to a rest on Fireflight’s shoulders in an unconscious attempt to keep them in contact in some way. He knew he should go, but he really, really, _really_ didn’t want to! “A groon is no time at all, really… Hey, look. I’ll give you my home terminal code, okay? You can call me when you have a moment. How’s that sound?”

“… Okay.”

Fireflight tried for a smile, but he knew that they both knew he wouldn’t be able to use it. Soon he wouldn’t have processor for anything but the Heat. At least not if everything he had ever been told was true. 

“I’ll… I’ll miss you, but you’d better go?” 

Sandstorm sent his code in a text and pulled Fireflight in for another quick hug just as an inquiring ping sounded from his comm. unit. 

“I guess I’d better…” he sighed as he pulled back. “I’ll miss you, too. Take care of yourself, and if anyone gives you trouble, you let me know when we talk next. I’ll sort ‘em out for you.” 

He took one last look at Fireflight before leaving, hating himself all the while for wanting to draw it out as long as he could. They would see each other soon enough, he had said so himself!

Fireflight frowned at the closed door, rubbing his chest plates without thinking. All his thoughts were on Sandstorm, the triple changer Tarnite leaving him… 

It wasn’t his fault! He didn’t want to go into Heat! 

Why couldn’t he be with Sandstorm for this? He’d much rather have Sandstorm than some random… whoever happened to be there when Heat hit…

* * *

Ignoring the irritated glares he got for taking so long, Sandstorm threw himself into an empty seat on the skimmer that would be taking him back to Tarn and growled at anyone who tried to talk to him. It was unfair of him to be so rude when he was normally sociable, but he didn’t care. He just wanted this groon over with!

Not long after he was situated, the skimmer’s pilot ordered them all to strap in because this was going to be a quick trip. The rest of the babble became background noise to the triple changer as he stared out the window at the Axiom as they took off, and he allowed self-loathing to swallow him up in its brooding embrace as he imagined just jumping from the skimmer and flying right back to Fireflight. He should… No. No, he shouldn’t. It wouldn’t be doing him any favors to do it! Not with Fireflight’s brothers and creator, not with their crewmates, not with Fireflight himself…

Frag, frag, frag…!

* * *

“I don’t want to!” Whoever was on the other side of his door could go frag himself! Fireflight mulishly turned his back on the world, curling up on the berth. His spark hurt, his entire chest hurt inside and outside… He didn’t want to go into Heat! He didn’t want anyone to touch him, because, because… He just didn’t want anyone to fragging touch him!

Air Raid sighed and thumped his head against the door that currently hid his brother. Fraggit all, he didn’t have time for this, this… temper tantrum! He was already fighting off his own heat cycle as best he could, struggling to think clearly long enough to get Fireflight home…

Kicking the door in frustration, the older Seeker growled, “Come _on_ , Fireflight, open this stupid door so we can go! You can’t lock yourself in there forever!”

“Yes, I can!” Fireflight yelled back, uncaring if whoever it was heard the muffled yelling or not. He didn’t even care who it was! He hurt and he was hot and it wasn’t in the least bit nice or fun! Everyone always said it would be fun to go into Heat… Well, not at the beginning because it was uncomfortable and foreign, but after that it was supposed to be good. If this was the normal beginning, he didn’t want it! No one had ever told him the beginning hurt!

“So help me, Fireflight, I will kick this door in if you do not open it right now!” Air Raid snarled. “You hear me? I’m not kidding! I don’t care what your malfunction is; you need to get over it because I don’t have much time or patience left!”

That actually had Fireflight sitting up, snarling back at the door as if it had offended him and not the one on the other side of it. “So try it! I dare you!” 

Growling lowly at the challenge, Air Raid took a step back and slammed his heel against the door as hard as he could. The effort left a sizeable dent but didn’t break it. Not that he had expected to, and now his pede really hurt, but it made him feel a little bit better to see the damage nonetheless. 

“Fragging hatchling… Even now, you’re nothing but a big sparkling! Open the fragging door so I can kick you this time! Zephyrus, what is your problem?!”

“It hurts! No one said it was going to hurt! I don’t want it to hurt and I don’t want anyone near me!” Well, not true… he wanted Sandstorm. Sandstorm always made him feel good and he was never ever mean!

“What do you mean, it hurts?” Air Raid asked, concern pushing through his growing agitation at the plaintive tone of his brother’s voice, muffled though it was. “You’re not injured, are you? Why didn’t you fragging say so from the start?”

“It just hurts! Now go away!” The other mech wasn’t making it better in the least. He was just annoying and, and… and keeping him from Sandstorm! They always tried to keep him away from Sandstorm. 

“Like fragging Pit I’m going away! Let me in so I can help you!” If someone had hurt Fireflight and he just didn’t want them to see… What if his heat had already started and someone took advantage? He knew Fireflight hadn’t had a chance to have his seals removed… Air Raid growled, wings hitching up high and threatening at the thought. It was a welcome relief from the licks of warmth that threatened to suffuse his chassis with the unbearable need to interface; it helped him think a little clearer.

“Please, ‘Flight, let me in!”

“No! This is all your fault!” And it was. They were the reason Sandstorm left, the reason why he was never there when Fireflight really wanted him to be. They called, they talked, they told… They never, ever listened! And now it hurt and Sandstorm wasn’t there!

“How is this my fault? I didn’t hurt you!” Air Raid insisted, frustrated with his brother’s nonsense.

“You always make him go away! And it hurts; it hurts so much when I can’t be with him!” Fireflight accused the door, no matter who was there it was sure to be a Seeker and all the Seekers had been trying to keep him and his Tarnite friend apart! 

‘Him’? Oh, no… Air Raid groaned. Zephyrus, please… “Fireflight… You’re not talking about that Tarnite, are you?”

“His name is Sandstorm!” Definitely a seeker and definitely one of the ones who were trying to ruin it between them!

“Go away! You are just like all the rest!”

“You didn’t _bond_ him, did you?” the older Seeker demanded to know, but didn’t need an answer before he realized the truth for himself. If they had bonded, there would have been no parting them without a fight. “No… You _didn’t_ bond him. Oh, frag, hatchling…” The picture was becoming all too clear in his mind and Air Raid groaned and thumped his head against the door a few times. What were the odds? 

“Fireflight, where does it hurt?”

“Where do you think?!” Fireflight felt a little like a ping pong ball, bouncing between depression and rage with every other sentence. Every time the speaker on the other side of the door spike he was angry, and then he became depressed. Hurting was the only constant...

Air Raid wanted to whine and throw a fit of his own because a groon was an awful long time and if he didn’t do something, Fireflight might not survive the separation if this really was what he thought it was… But why did it have to be a Tarnite? Why did it have to be now? And slaggit, why did he have to be the one here taking care of this? Skydive would have been much better suited, or Silverbolt… But nooo, they all had to go into Heat already!

“I dunno, your fragging pede? Don’t take this out on me because you let your resonant get away!” 

“Go away, idiot!” Fireflight hissed angrily and curled up again. He wanted to wallow, if it had to hurt he might as well just immerse himself in it and being angry prevented that, made the hurting sharp and fresh with each heavy beat of his spark. 

Glaring at the door, Air Raid snarled, “Ungrateful little fragger… Ought to just leave your aft here alone and go home, but I love you so I’ll fix this.” He kicked the door again out of spite and then took off down the hall. He was going to have to haul aft to catch that skimmer… Fireflight was going to owe him big for this!

Fireflight just ignored the grumbling and the reverberating clang of metal on metal, curling up tighter and ignoring the world as best he could. Trying to get used to the pain in his spark, the ebb and flow of it…

* * *

It took some doing, but Air Raid caught up with the skimmer. Thankfully, they were out past the spires that surrounded Vos’ main city already so it was easy enough to ping the pilot and convince them to land, although they seemed skeptical about his insistence that there was something onboard that he really needed.

Really, it was probably his threat of shooting them down if they didn’t comply that made them land. But details, who needed those?

He barely waited for the skimmer to touch down before demanding entrance and, once he got it, storming into the open seating area. He looked them all over, but all foreigners looked the same to him so he sighed in defeat and put his hands on his hips.

“Alright, which one of you fraggers is Sandstorm?”

Sandstorm barely noticed that they were descending for an emergency landing. He was so focused on not completely flipping his lid with the frustration and the growing ache in his spark that nothing else mattered until a Seeker (but not his Seeker, not Fireflight) entered the main cabin and asked for him specifically. He didn’t know how the mech knew him, but he didn’t like the mech’s attitude so he glared right back at him and said, “That’d be me.”

Air Raid was almost relieved that he had picked the right skimmer. Being Tarnite didn’t necessarily mean he would go back to Tarn, after all… He pushed that thought aside (there were more important things to deal with first) and stepped between rows of seats until he was before the orange mech. 

“Good. You need to come with me,” he said. With practiced movements, he deftly undid the triple changer’s harness so he could start tugging on him, urging him from his seat just as the pilot of the skimmer entered the room.

“Now,” he ordered pointedly as he hauled the Tarnite out of his seat and toward the exit, though he did pause long enough to gently push the pilot away from where he was barricading the door with a hurried, “No time for questions! We have to go!”

Sandstorm was torn between anger and confusion, and settled for getting some answers. Why did Seekers always have to be so slagging difficult for him? “Go where?”

“I said no time! Transform and let’s go! Fireflight’s waiting!” Air Raid insisted as they descended the stairs and left the skimmer. Now that he wasn’t so stressed out by the possibility that Fireflight’s life might be in danger, he could feel his own Heat coming back with a vengeance and he’d be damned if he was going to get caught up in it with… Well, his brother’s… No, he wasn’t even going to think about that!

Air Raid leapt down the last few steps and transformed, gunning his engine to get away from the ground and was glad that he didn’t have to fight with the mech to get him to do the same; a moment later, the harsh chopping sound of rotors cutting through the air reached his audios and he said, “Try to keep up!” just before taking off back in the direction of Vos. Any further questions from the Tarnite went unheard over the roar of their engines, and Air Raid was happy about that. It was hard enough to think now; he didn’t want to try and speak any more than necessary…

* * *

Someone else was banging on the door now, someone bigger… or at least stronger than the other one. Fireflight reluctantly uncurled to glare uncharitably at the door. 

“ _Go away_!” It really could not be that hard, could it? He just wanted them all to leave him the frag alone!

From the other side of the door, Sandstorm turned to glare at the Vosian beside him (Air Raid, he had finally gotten the mech to tell him upon landing near the Axiom, and gods, was it a shocker to find that one of Fireflight’s own brothers was bringing him back to Fireflight). When all he received was a distracted, helpless shrug, he growled and reached for the control panel. Hacking his way into Fireflight’s quarters may as well be his secondary function by now… Maybe he would just trade codes with the mech later so he didn’t have to go to the trouble anymore.

His hands fumbled as he tried to rewire it like he usually did, and the Tarnite groaned when he realized he was shaking. Fireflight was just on the other side of the door and he needed him, and he couldn’t even think enough to hack a rudimentary lock like this? After three tries, the door finally cycled open and Sandstorm slumped in relief. It was terribly hard to think past needing to see his friend _now_ …

He entered the room and locked optics with the white Seeker, and already he felt better. 

“Fireflight…”

“Sandstorm? Sandstorm!” Fireflight launched himself from the berth with a screech of joy and adhered himself to the Tarnite’s front. He hissed uncharitably at the second mech present, not even bothering to try and figure out who it was as he tried to burrow into orange armor. 

Air Raid made a derisive sound at Fireflight’s uncharacteristic display of aggression. “Like I said, fraggin’ ungrateful…” he muttered, but it was with a smile. He took a step back when he felt the flare of Fireflight’s field, all hot and needy, and his own field responded with similar needs. He needed to go, needed to find a partner… “I’m out of here. Take care of my brother or your aft is toast.”

Sandstorm barely heard the other Seeker depart as he wound his arms around Fireflight and rumbled lowly, reassuringly. “‘Flight… I don’t understand, I was just told to come back and I’m so happy to see you but your heat, I shouldn’t be here…”

“My spark isn’t hurting anymore! We need to go… we can’t – the Axiom really isn’t the best place…” Fireflight just enjoyed the closeness, the heat of Sandstorm’s chassis, so he wasn’t thinking much about his words but in his processor he was trying to fit them on his berth and failing. They really needed to go someplace else! 

Finally he managed to make himself squirm out of the embrace, only to start pushing and tugging on the larger mech in an attempt to get them both out of the room. And off the ship; there was so many more options off ship. 

“Come on, come on! We need a proper nest… or you know, anything not here, because _here_ is not working. Berth, fuel… especially berth, and fast, I don’t know, I don’t hurt anymore but I really want to do stuff! I don’t know how to do stuff, but you do? Right? Yes, you do, I know you do, Sandstorm, come on! Get out and let’s find a place of some sort, with fuel!” 

Hurting? Fireflight was hurting before? Sandstorm wanted to ask, but he couldn’t talk and walk very well, it seemed, not with Fireflight blabbering away at hyperspeed. He managed vague yeses and sures as the white Vosian led him off the Axiom, at least until he realized just what Fireflight was asking for. 

He forced the Seeker to stop walking and turned him so they were looking at one another. “Wait, wait, Fireflight! Hold on, you can’t be serious… Me staying means that we’ll end up… Well, uh. Interfacing. You know that, right? You’re okay with that?”

“Yes? You know how to, right? Then I am okay with it, I want it… but we really need to find some place, a good place with fuel! It’s important, Sandstorm, it is really important!” Fireflight frowned uncertainly at Sandstorm’s continued reluctance, feeling a small amount of dread beginning to grow. “You want to, don’t you? You are feeling it too, right?” 

“Yes, I know how to and yes… Gods, yes, I want to. But… Fireflight, you know I love you, right? Like, not just as friends even though I tried my best to keep it that way… And this… I don’t… I don’t want to be just some Heat induced fling for you. It’s been harder and harder to keep away from you ever since we were told to return home for the Heat…” Sandstorm grimaced as he said it, and wished he had his mask and visor on, but refused to look away from Fireflight. He’d take rejection like the grown mech he was!

“I don’t know what a fling is? Or wait, I do, that’s when you berth someone you don’t care about, right? Well, I love you, so you’re not a fling, you’re… you’re something else, something important! I hurt so bad when you left, I just wanted you to come back, and now you’re back and I don’t want you to leave again ever! You’re not going to leave me, are you?” his coding might have finally fully matured, but Fireflight still had the giant optics of the younglings and he looked at Sandstorm with them at their widest. Hopeful, scared, almost but not quite sad. 

Something important… Sandstorm thought he could live with that for now. He smiled, a little shakily but still genuine, and nodded his acceptance. He then took Fireflight’s hand so he could lead them out. 

“I dunno how many times I’ve got to tell you, I’m not going anywhere. I’m with you as long as you want me to be. So let’s get you taken care of and go from there, huh?”

“Good! I want you to stay forever then,” Fireflight smiled brilliantly. His spark was dancing behind his chest plates, pulses still hard and heavy but of joy instead of pain now.


End file.
